PPP as relevant today as it was 45 years ago

Daily Times

At 45, the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) is the only political party that has continued to sustain its prevailing presence in all parts of the country and is in power for the fourth time at a critical juncture of the country’s chequered political history where it can help the nation assume a path of protracting the democracy.

Born in Lahore on November 30, 1967, at the residence of one of party’s leading lights of the time, Dr Mubashar Hasan, and in the presence of couple of hundred delegates from all across the country, the party began its tireless journey with the slogan of bringing a real change in society. The party championed the cause of the poor with the ever-lasting slogan of ‘Roti, Kapra aur Makan’ and rose to power in record four years of political struggle and that too sans the support of the all powerful security establishment.

The party’s incredible rise to power was made possible by its supporting the cause of peasants and trade union movements with student unions all across the country coming to its side for the dispensation of a message modern in nature and offering equal opportunities to all. In its three years’ campaign for brining a real change in society, the PPP actually became the only representative party of the oppressed and suppressed classes of society. It helped change the deep-rooted political culture of politics and power being the favourite pastime of rich and influential that mostly hail from families of landlords in Sindh, Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The PPP’s first government (1971-77) with founder chairman Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto underwent tumults happenings. The term began after the dismemberment of the country following defeat in 1971 war at the hands of India. However, afterward until 1977 when the party ended its term prematurely and called in fresh elections, the PPP took numerous decisions that helped the country to get back on its legs, although few of those decisions ultimately proved disastrous. The party helped the economy grow at a greater pace besides improving the plight of the poor, but its decisions such as nationalisation of the economy and educational institutions proved counterproductive. The PPP government did help the nation get its first unanimously approved and democratically evolved constitution in 1973 but the decision aimed at Islamisation of society such as declaring Ahmedis as non-Muslims, weekly holiday on Friday and closing down bars all across the country to appease the hot-blooded religious parties still being seen as the initial move on which military dictator Ziaul Haq (1977-1988) later on converted society of hate-mongers as it continues to thrive even today. It was the first government of the PPP which helped evolved a consensus constitution voted for by all from conservative right to the ultra-left. The PPP introduced land reforms, launched the nuclear programme, built the first and still the only steel mill in the country besides undertaking numerous high quality industrial projects. It was the PPP government which helped bring in the country petrodollars and helped poor feel the good factor for the first time by sending manpower to the developing Gulf countries. Of all the big happenings for the first time was also the hanging of the first democratically elected prime minister, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, in 1977 through the most controversial judicial verdict. The PPP is also the first and only political party that resisted the tyranny of one of the most cunning military dictator for eleven long years from 1977-1988. The PPP became the only political party that helped the election of first woman prime minister, Benazir Bhutto, in 1988 through a resilient democratic struggle against not any political party but an entrenched-to-the-core powerful military establishment of the country. The PPP is the only political party whose workers rendered unprecedented sacrifices for the cause of democracy and oppressed classes and can still be found in the same terrain though with a varying degree of intensity to the initial programme of the party that still holds its important in a society reeling far more destabilised internally and externally. The party tried to learn the art of living with the monster of military establishment in its second, third and presently the fourth stint in power in a polity that has a equilibrium of power still heavily tilted towards the powerful security and intelligence establishment. Looking at the two stints in power of the PPP under Benazir Bhutto during 90s, called as the era of controlled democracy, it appears that the party has done far better after her heroic sacrifice in December 2007 for the cause of democracy as far as the question of negotiating its stay in power with the power security establishment is concerned. Benazir Bhutto died at the hands of terrorists, the monster that Ziaul Haq created in 1979 and bred by the security establishment after him until 2001 in the misconceived quest of strategic depth in Afghanistan. In fact the two Afghan wars (1979-1987 and 2001 until date) that Pakistan fought with military establishment at the helm of affairs and the PPP on the receiving end, have telling lessons for all. With no remorse in sight from the security establishment as well as those from their so-called political cahoots for fighting a war to ruin society, the PPP has a task before it, though it appears not as politically strong as it was during the era of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and Benazir Bhutto. The PPP, at 45, appears to have been leaning more towards the cause of status quo being presented to it by said to be far more weak and wounded security establishment due to its over two-decade-long involvement in Afghanistan, than before. The challenges the PPP is facing at the moment are being considered far more intense in nature than before. The PPP is at the helm of affairs of a country facing all sorts of challenges. The PPP is faced with a security establishment as challenging as before at a moment when both are reeling under the credibility matter – the later on the security front and the former on the political front. The PPP with the help of sustained reconciliatory efforts has created a political environment where a government led by it is threatened more by state institutions – the military and the judiciary – than the political opposition. The PPP is said to have mastered the art of overpowering and taming the opposition thanks to the ‘crafty’ leadership of President Asif Ali Zardari, who is also co-chairman of the party with Bilawal Bhutto Zaradri –the fourth generation of Bhutto family – as its chairman. The PPP is delicately poised at the moment after 45 successful years in popular and power politics to steer the nation out of the morass the military rule has put it in by helping the polity to secure a rare democratic transition in the country. Keep the polity on the path of democracy and undo the existential threat being faced by the country is perhaps the cause for which the PPP was created 45 years ago by the hapless people of the time. The same hapless people wanted it to help them change their fate, which is not to be permanently poor and backward as Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto once told them in 1974 in Lahore at the time of Islamic Summit Conference.