SERAIKI PROVINCE, A SHOCK TO PML-N POLITICS

PML-N and its leadership ruled the Punjab for the fifth time and it faced no major challenges as the leadership was in the good book of the Establishment. It was a comfortable rule over the Punjab and the N-League leaders facing minor and insignificant challenges. For the first time, the PPP put the PML-N in a very defensive position by floating the idea of Seraiki Province that is too from carving out of the present boundaries of Punjab province. The PPP leaders, in a calculated manner, first floated the idea and gathered mass support and also support from the coalition parties and other political forces outside the Government to the disadvantage of the PML-N. Recently, the PPP succeeded in passing through a resolution from the National Assembly at a time when the PML-Members were busy in agitating their political points against the Government. It was a big score by the PPP against the PML-N, to say the least. It is a fact that the PPP had picked up solid political issues like Seraiki Province, a relief to more than 80 million people of Southern Punjab while the PML-N is engaged in abstract politics whipping up the old slogan of independent judiciary or implementing the SC court verdicts which had different interpretation for every politician and political activists. On abstract judicial issue, the PML-N is unlikely to gather support from the people in order to put necessary pressure on the PPP Government at the Centre or in other provinces. PPP is consolidating its position in Southern Punjab and poised to form the Provincial Government in Multan/ Bahawalpur if the province is created before the General elections. It will win absolute majority seats for the National Assembly confining the PML-N to G.T. Road Constituencies where Imran Khan is another contender for power. It seems that politics of PML-N is doomed and Mian Nawaz Sharif is fighting the war of survival in the present phase to organize a long march to Islamabad. It is a fact that the PML-N public meeting at Taxila, the constituency of Chaudhary Nisar Ali Khan, Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly, was a total flop. According to independent observers a few thousands people were occupying the chairs at the venue of public meeting addressed by the top PML-N leaders explaining their policies for coming days.