Calculated Risk
The President’s proposal to hold a referendum seeking public opinion for remaining President after October 2002 was approved by the Cabinet and the National Security Council on April 3, 2002. Preliminary indications are that the referendum will be held on May 6, by the time this goes into the print the President will have announced the date during his address to the nation. The purpose of the exercise is to determine whether the people of Pakistan approve of the President or not, and more importantly, would they want him to continue post-October 2002? Most of the major political parties, among them PML, PPP, JI, JUI and JUP, oppose the referendum on the plea that referendums are only meant to solicit public opinion on matters of great national importance and are not to be used as an election tool. On the other hand the President’s idea has received the support of quite a few smaller parties, among them PML(Q), PTI etc.
Surely, with the past record the political parties of total mis-governance and making a hash of the nation’s affairs, General Pervez Musharraf should have no problem getting the people’s vote of confidence. Political parties in Pakistan long ago lost the trust of a majority of the people, having been given numerous opportunities in the past at governance at which they failed miserably. Now they should have no locus standi. Yet being persistent, they must cry themselves hoarse at every opportunity to justify their “democratic” existence. The proposed exercise should be in fact a unique opportunity for the people to indicate whether their confidence in the political parties has been restored? The onus of credibility acquisition should be on the political parties, that should be the real referendum. If it were left to me, instead of asking whether the people want General Pervez Musharraf, the referendum would ask the question “if you think the President should not continue as President after October 2002, then vote “NO”! The political parties are proclaiming to high heaven that the President does not have the people’s support, on the contrary the masses support the political parties. As such they should have no problems in getting people to come out of their homes to vote NO, after all during general elections they usually spend a fortune from their ill-gotten gains on providing transportation, meals, etc for the voters on Election Day. If the Referendum had adopted this route, those in favour of General Pervez Musharraf would have stayed home. If the negative vote was more than 50% of the electorate that normally vote in any election ie. 36% vote in the last National Assembly Elections would mean 18% of the electorate in the Referendum, we would know the people are not with the President but with the political parties. However if “the great silent majority” voted with their feet and stayed home, we would have had confirmation that Pakistani people approve of the President. But give the President credit for not following this “negative” route when he could easily have done so. Knowing that Gen Zia’s referendum hurt the credibility of the exercise, he has the absolute courage to test the nation’s resolve by putting his own credibility on the line.
