Adil Najam
Former Prime Minister and PML(N) leader Nawaz Sharif is back in Pakistan.
Reportedly he landed in Lahore to a large reception by his supporters and was escorted to a special bullet proof car that had been brought for him. According to The News:
A special plane carrying the PML-N Chief Nawaz Sharif, his brother Shahbaz Sharif and other family members arrived in Lahore from the holy city of Madina on Sunday evening. The convoys of PML-N workers arrived in Lahore to accord rousing welcome to Sharifs. Large welcome banners and pictures of Sharif brothers have been displayed at several places in Lahore. The special plane Boeing777 carried Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz Sharif along with 26 members of their family from the holy city of Madina.
The central and provincial leaders of PML-N, lawyers and members of civil society have arrived to receive Sharifs at Lahore Airport. Nawaz Sharif is expected to first visit Data Darbar in a procession and address a public meeting. Security had been tightened in Lahore especially on the airport ahead of arrival of the PML-N leader. Provincial home department has allowed only hundred party leaders to receive Sharifs at the airport, party sources claimed.
According to sources, bullet-proof cars for Sharifs reached in Lahore last night from Saudi Arabia. Meanwhile, the home department said that the authorities have decided to give free hand to Nawaz Sharif but he has not been permitted for holding a public meeting and rally.
Nawaz Sharif, Shahbaz Sharif and other family members will be transported to home from the airport, a home department statement said. However, thousands of PML-N workers succeeded in arriving airport by crossing the barricades put up by police. On this occasion, the workers raised slogans both in favour of Nawaz Sharif and against the government.
Readers would remember from our prior posts that in August the Supreme Court of Pakistan had ruled that he could, in fact, return to Pakistan despite whatever ‘deal’ he had made with Gen. Musharraf at teh time of his original flight to Saudi Arabia. However, when he did return to the country in September, he was unceremoniously and dramatically deported back to Saudi Arabia with theatrics which rivaled his own attempts not to let Gen. Musharraf land in Pakistan many moons ago.
Now it turns out that he has made yet another ‘deal’ with Gen. Musharraf which has enabled his return.
It is not fully clear what the ‘terms’ of this deal are. Nor what the Musharraf-Nawaz Sharif deal mean
s for the earlier Musharraf-Benazir deal that had enabled her return some weeks back. Nor, in fact, is it clear what what his return (and the fact that now both Benazir and Nawaz Sharif are back in Pakistan) will mean for the future of Pakistan’s politics and the (supposed) forthcoming elections.
In despair, one even wonders if it means anything at all? Or is this just one more drama in the string of topi dramas that have come to define our distraught and fractured polity?
@RE
“I have lived in the streets of Spain , Paris , New Orleans , Arizona , New York and San Francisco since 1983. Based on my life experience I place my 100% trust behind Mushraf ”
how does living in the streets of the above mentioned places make your opinions more weighty?
you are incessantly touting the 11bn reserves without considering that what is the cost of this aid/donations and how short lived their benefits are. They have costed us our sovereignty .. Musharraf does whatever Uncle Sam tells him to do.. be it annouce elections.. uniform issue etc etc.
Our Foreign debts are on the other hand on a record high
http://tinyurl.com/ypts2g
and the rich poor difference is far more than ever.
This reserve is currently the benefit of the upper class and we are told that it will “trickle down” to the masses in time.
Not in a corrupt society without independant judiciary it doesnt.
And without the full support of those whom we routinely and contemptuously dismiss as “mullahs” there is no one who can remonstrate with the militants.
well said Viqar Minai.
It is tragic that we have to go through all this violence(bombing, gunships, operations, deals) before finally admitting that there is a sizeable population who sympathize with clerics and whose sentiments are real. We cannot simply coerce them into beleiving what we beleive.
this is the other side of intolerance.
@Dr Najam
I agree with you completely. This is the same same Nawaz Sharif in whose tenure, SC was blatantly attacked, bank accounts were frozen by imposition of emergency, President of Pakistan was removed unceremoniously and the likes of Rafiq Tarrar was made President, when Musharraf took over in a peaceful coup in 1999 there was not a single Pakistani who opposed it by protesting on the road as everyone agreed that Nawaz Sharif got what he deserved. Let I forget, our foreign reserves were hardly US$1billion which are now to the tune of US$16billion.
This is the same BB in whose tenure, her husband openly asked for money to get a job done. Mr. 10%! He made deals with SGS Cotecna, ate commissions. He made the deal with the French on selling Mirage aircrafts to Pakistan. This is the same BB in whose tenure her brother was ruthlessly murdered in the streets of Karachi and yet she did nothing. This is the same BB who in her first and second tenure plundered government money and opened shopping mall on Constitution Avenue in Islamabad!
Let us as Pakistanis not be naive enough to forget and forgive so quickly. Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me, try to fool me the third time, well you have not learned your lesson!
Dear Readers:
I am amazed at the short memory span some people have. Does anyone even care that your politicians stole your money in the past and now want to rob you again! Yes, some will get short-term dividends for being loyal, but in the long run everyone suffers. Especially those who are already disenfranchised due to illiteracy and poverty. What do you see as your future? Please think before you exercise your right to vote.
I have lived in the streets of Spain , Paris , New Orleans , Arizona , New York and San Francisco since 1983. Based on my life experience I place my 100% trust behind Mushraf considering what other options we have in Pakistan.Be smart do not play in the hands of enemy. Enemy hates Pakistan because few reason among them Pakistan got 11 billion dollars from USA and UAE to support business in Pakistan despite state of emergency check this link http://www.ameinfo.com/137646.html
Act like civilized country we are nuke power show and act like one .Protest like humans not like animals .Where is the protest against extremist evils? This is the number one threat Pakistan has not Mushraf?
Allah Bless Pakistan
Please read this perspective “Bhutto and Sharif decry dictatorship, while seeking a deal with Pakistan’s US-backed military regime”
By Keith Jones:
“Early last week Musharraf, accompanied by Pakistan’s intelligence chief, made an impromptu visit to Saudi Arabia, for talks about Sharif, who was exiled there in 2000. In the past Musharraf has mused about a possible deal with Sharif and his re-entry into Pakistani politics and the revival of the Punjab-based PML (N) could serve the military government by acting as a counter-weight to the Sindh-based PPP. But there is much press speculation that Musharraf’s hand was forced by a decision of Saudi King Abdullah, possibly acting at Washington’s bequest, to stop acting effectively as Sharif’s jailer. Until now the Bush administration has had little time for Sharif and it effectively supported his re-deportation from Pakistan last September. But there is nothing in Sharif’s conservative politics that would militate against Washington working with him.
What can be said with assurance is that King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia—who like Musharraf is a close ally of the Bush administration and certainly no advocate of democracy—would not have released Sharif from the terms of his exile in Saudi Arabia and effectively sponsored his return to Pakistan if he had not been certain that Sharif would not cut across Washington’s plans to maintain a military-dominated government in Pakistan.
Not only did King Abdullah meet for two hours and dine with Sharif on Friday, he lent him the plane that brought him back to Pakistan.”
And finally:
“If all sections of the bourgeois opposition are conniving with the Musharraf regime and contemplating participating in the sham January 8 elections, it is because they all covet a slice of political power and the patronage prerogative that goes with it and fear that if they boycott the elections their rivals will benefit. Even more importantly, they all are terrified of a genuine popular mobilization against military rule, for they recognize that the military is the bulwark of their privileges—of the Pakistani nation-state and Pakistan’s vastly unequal property-relations. “
Nawaz Sharif has been making all the right noises since his return. If he continues like this his popularity will grow manifold. On the other hand, if he becomes a part of this musharraf/army system, then he will become just another benazir bhutto !!!
BTW, Moody’s has downgraded the outlook on Pakistan’s rating to negative….
Another feather in the cap of Mush!!!!
The man has no shame……