The central question that seemed to be addressing the Leaders of the House and the Opposition in their choice of caretaker Prime Minister seems to be that of building a consensus, irrespective of the real requirements of the job, which are that the person selected should have the national interest at heart. That means that that person would conduct the affairs of state for the period he holds office in accordance with the needs of Pakistan, not that of some other nation. The nomination of Dr Hafeez Sheikh by the government, and Dr Ishrat Hussain by the Opposition, revives suspicion about their nominations with the end of the government’s tenure coinciding with the talk of a new IMF package being needed. Even though the depredations wrought by that Washington Consensus institutions on the economies where it has intervened, have always proved to be harshly anti-people.
Now that the government and the opposition are at the end of their roles, with some of them likely to find themselves unseated, this is not the time to play politics, of which there will be plenty in the coming election campaign. The nominations should not be used for this, as seems to have been the case, with the opposition and government rejecting each other’s nominees for caretaker Prime Minister, after the choices were made with a view to politicking in the first place. Dr Hafeez might have been a technocrat, but he was part of the outgoing government. Dr Ishrat was nominated as State Bank Governor under the Musharraf regime. The PPP has rejected Rasul Bux Palijo as being an opponent, and it cannot be gainsaid that he has no administrative experience. While the PML-N has dropped one of the ex-judges it named, Shakirullah Jan, it retained M Nasir Salam Zahid. The PPP named Mir Hazar Khan Khoso, also formerly of the Supreme Court. Both had completed the two years after retirement that government servants are supposed to observe in which they are not allowed to accept government office. This is not the case with the caretaker Chief Minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Mr Justice (retd) Tariq Pervez, the first caretaker agreed upon. That a caretaker is a former judge should not help if he does not meet the requirements, and that would render not just his caretaker government, but the elections he is installed for, doubtful. Neither of the two parties should have taken that risk.