After clearing the last hurdle in the confrontation with individuals and institutions by having Justice Rafiq Tarar elected as President, the Pakistan Prime Minister appears to be safely ensconced as the strongest element in the power equation in Islamabad. By replacing Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah with Chief Justice Ajmal Mian, the Prime Minister has attempted to constrain the powers of the judiciary to pose a challenge to his government.The armed forces have preferred to remain content with protecting their own turf and studiously refused any temptation of intervening when the crisis had reached a flash point. There have also been indications that the new President appears willing to allow Constitutional changes which would make Parliament the supreme decision making body in the country. In seeking to develop a cordon sanitaire, which would prevent any other institution or individual from mounting another non-political challenge to his rule, Nawaz Sharif has preferred persons who have a proven record ofloyalty to his family.In choosing Rafiq Tarar as the Pakistan Muslim League's candidate for the presidency, Sharif appeared to have given short shrift to the idea that a head of state should be representative of the entire country. By choosing Tarar, his critics contend that Sharif has revealed both a partisan and provincial attitude to politics and governance in Pakistan. It is an unprecedented development in Pakistan's political structure that of all the important posts available, just a couple of them including that of the Speaker of the National Assembly, Foreign Minister and the new Chief Election Commissioner are held by non-Punjabis.Although Sharif had defended his decision to field Justice Tarar for the Presidency on grounds that the Constitution did not stipulate any quota system for elected posts, his critics contend that this effort to insulate himself from future attacks by different institutions within the Establishment has caused resentment in the smaller provinces, which now see the all pervasive Punjabi domination of Pakistan's polity and administration. Critics of choosing a President who also hails from the Punjab contend that Punjab has 178 votes in the Presidential voting system and the rest of the communities have a total of 298 votes. A profile of ethnic communities in Pakistan's ruling elites would reveal an overwhelming domination by the Punjabis in the armed forces, the bureaucracy as well as in the political arena. The Pathans, who over the past five decades have been noticeably coopted into the power stakes, largely as a result of their larger numbers in the officer corps of the armed forces, continue to remain a distant second. The Sindhis and the Baluch who have historically had a token representation in the armed forces and bureaucracy and therefore by implication in the power equation, continue to remain heavily marginalised.Politically, the Baluch have remained on the fringes of the power zone, while the Sindhis have fared better thanks to the Bhuttos. For the first time,the PPP does not hold the reins of power in the Sind Provincial Assembly. Disillusionment with the PPP and the Bhuttos has been a major reason for its electoral reverses, but the other factor has been Sharif's ability to appeal to the urban and rural masses in Punjab on a purely provincial platform. This is expectedly leading to greater attention on Punjab.While Sharif continues to assert that as the elected leader of the country with the largest mandate, he remains free to choose his team, the impact of the recent criticism for giving Punjab an overwhelming share of the top government posts is beginning to sink in. By choosing Justice Abdul Qadeer Chaudhary, an ethnic Baluch as the new Chief Election Commissioner, to replace the interim incumbent Justice Mukhtar Ahmed Junejo, Sharif is signalling changed tactics. But the choice of Justice Abdul Qadeer is interesting because in his judgments on the bench, including the 1993 case regarding Sharif's dismissal, he has decided in favour of the Prime Minister. By trying to convert Pakistan into a Sharif Inc., the strongman from Punjab may invite growing political opposition from the smaller provinces.
