ON A day which brought embarrassment to Pakistan because Osama bin Laden was successfully targeted and killed by US Navy Seals at Abbotabad, the PML (Q) sarcastically known as quislings, joined their erstwhile detractors PPP and took oath as Ministers and advisors. PPP and PML (Q) were at daggers drawn because the PPP led a successful campaign to oust the Quislings from power. Both were highly vocal in their rhetoric against each other. The PPP was especially targeting the allegedly failed policies of the Quislings, which is a major cause of Pakistan’s current malaise, especially the terror attacks. It is being rued that the Quislings, who allowed the morass to deepen, permitting the US to have bases in Pakistan as well allow its CIA operators the freedom and opportunity to roam Pakistan’s streets with unauthorized weapons, killing people randomly, give a tacit approval to drone attacks, which have taken a toll of more than 34,000 lives, chose this day to take their oath of office. They could have delayed it for a day or two to avoid the irony.
The biggest losers in this game of musical chairs are the people of Pakistan. Their problems multiply in geometric progression. There is constant power outage, fuel costs have reached astronomical proportions, terror attacks take constant toll of precious human lives, and most people find it extremely difficult to make both ends meet. Yet the current dispensation in the government, having slashed its large brigade of ministers, advisors and baggage handlers earlier, has once again enlarged the cabinet, adding to the woes of the people, since it is the taxpayers who will bear the burden of the luxurious lifestyles of the Cabinet or the cash strapped nation will pay debt servicing exorbitant amounts to sustain the perks of the Quislings.
All this has been brought to the fore expeditiously, since the PPP is rapidly losing its allies and was facing the discomfort of a minority, which would not have been able to even have the next budget passed what to talk of major legislature. They say politics finds strange bedfellows, but the case of the recent romantic wooing of the Quislings by PPP to woo their erstwhile detractors makes a prosaic arrangement, which has all the trappings of a cheap love affair of convenience. Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, the founder of the Pakistan Peoples’ Party had at one time jailed the father of Chaudhry Shujaat, the leader of the Quislings and later Bhutto was hanged for the alleged assassination under his orders of a political foe Mahmud Kasuri. When the Quislings were in power, Benazir Bhutto was assassinated and the PPP has been blaming them of criminal neglect. Now the two groups find it expedient to become allies. Time will tell whether the Quislings will be able to resolve some of the problems of the people or go down in history as another pathetic bunch of opportunists. – Dailymailnews
