| Published on 10-01-2008 In World | | Viewed 1740 times | | Will Asif Zardari become Sonia Gandhi of Pakistan? |
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| Written by
N.R.Mohanty | 
When Asif Zardari told the media that he wanted to do a Sonia Gandhi, to the Pakistan People's Party-led government he was making several presumptions. One, that the PPP will come up trumps in the polls on Feb.18 and form the government. Two, there will be an overwhelming demand from the rank and file of the party for him to take up the leadership role in the government as was the case with Sonia Gandhi. Three, his nominated prime minister, Makhdum Amin Fahim, would allow him to do backseat pedaling of his government for long.
But the most significant presumption he made was that his position in the Bhutto dynasty is similar to Sonia's position in the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. Both of them are outsiders at birth, but allied to the respective families by marriage. When an insider-by-birth member of the family is not available to take up the crown, then the insider-by-marriage has to step in to keep the seat warm till the legitimate progeny is ready to assume the mantle.
Sonia Gandhi is doing the same for Rahul Gandhi and Asif Zardari wants to do the same for Bilawal. Both get their legitimacy as spouses and are likely to enjoy the privileges of power as long as their children, the original heirs, consent to it.
This is the grand spectacle of a royal drama unfolding in the subcontinent since independence. And the interesting part is that this drama is being enacted in the centre-stage of democratic politics. We have a spectacular show of a democratic royalty.
Sonia Gandhi and Asif Zardari can be located at the third generation of the political royalty of the respective countries. The first generation of both the families began the political baptism during the British rule. The grandfather of Sonia's husband, Jawaharlal Nehru, was the most important figure, next to Gandhi, in the Indian National Congress that spearheaded the anti-British rule in India. The grandfather of Zardari's wife, Shahnawaz Bhutto, was not a national leader like Nehru, but he was the pre-eminent leader of the province of Sindh, with his Sindh People's Party spearheading the campaign in favour of the continuance of the British rule.
After independence, Jawaharlal went on to become the Prime Minister of the country, but Shahnawaz was content in remaining a regional player. When the second generation came to prominence, the seeds of dynasty were sown, in a rather hostile environment. Jawaharlal's daughter, Indira Gandhi, had to face huge hostility from senior Congress leaders, but she showed her astuteness in sidelining them and consolidating her position as the leader of the Indian National Congress and the pre-eminent leader of the country of her time.
Shahnawaz's son, Zulfiqar Bhutto, was more ambitious a leader than his father, and he made the pitch for a national party and christened it as Pakistan People's Party. It goes to his credit that he made the PPP his vehicle to become the president and then the prime minister of his country.
In both the countries, the second-generation leadership met violent death. Zulfiqar was killed by the military-judiciary connivance and Indira was a victim of Punjab militancy. By the time of their death, the new generation was ready to take over, though there was a time lag in the case of Pakistan. Indira had groomed Rajiv to step into her shoes when needed.
Since she died in harness, it was a smooth transition, with Rajiv becoming the prime minister at the age of 40, barely a few hours after his mother's assassination.
Benazir was not that lucky, as her father died as a prisoner and a military junta was in power when he was hanged. She was barely 26 then and had to wage a relentless struggle against the Zia-ul-Haq regime. But her efforts paid off and she became the Prime Minister of Pakistan at the age of 35.
As it turned out, the third generation of the political dynasty in both the countries fell to the suicide bombers. And, incidentally, both of them died while out of power, while seeking the mandate of the people during the elections. Their end came at a relatively young age; Rajiv at 47 and Benazir at 53. That is why their children had not come of age to succeed them instantly. Bilawal, Benazir's son, is barely 19 now. When Rajiv Gandhi died, Rahul, his son, was just about 21. Rahul was studying in UK then, as Bilawal is doing now.
When the progeny is not ready, the spouse must take over, as the popular wisdom suggested that the party could not be held together without the dynasty at the helm. But in case of Sonia, she was not ready yet to take the plunge, as the opportunity came all of a sudden and she was not prepared for it. The mantle therefore passed on temporarily to Narasimha Rao, the senior most leader in the Congress. But the Royal family did not nominate him; in fact, he managed to catapult himself to the position, in spite of the family, only after a fiercely democratic struggle within the party. To that extent, his tenure would be considered as the democratic interlude in the royal repast in the history of the Congress in the last four decades.
When Sonia was ready to lead the party, she faced little resistance; the mantle passed on to her as if she was the natural claimant to the throne. She led her party to the victory at the hustings. But she did not take up the position of the prime minister as she felt that that would give a handle to the opposition to agitate over her foreign origin. She couldn't afford to install a senior leader like Pranab Mukherjee who is politically astute enough to spread his wings and cut her to size. She instead chose someone like Manmohan Singh, who is academically and bureaucratically competent, but politically inept and would be pliable to meet any exigency.
Zardari wants the same theatre played out in the Pakistani stage. Just as Sonia's foreign origin was a hindrance to her acceptability, his 'Mr. 10 per cent' tag is likely to cause a discordant note in his leadership claim. He, like Benazir, feels that Fahim, a lackluster politician, would be a better bet to carry out the commands of the Bhutto family than someone like Aitzaz Ahsan, a prominent leader of the party who has been sidelined of late because he showed his mettle in leading a lawyers' agitation against Musharraf.
But, then, the question is, will Zardari be able to play out the role of Sonia in a PPP government in Pakistan, as he wishes to? The future will tell. But as Sonia and Zardari prepare the ground for the fourth generation of the dynasty to ascend the throne, we are witness to the unsavoury spectacle of feudal democracy. |
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