Pressure cooker

As the nation absorbs the shock of the death of Salmaan Taseer, the business of politics continues. On the day he was assassinated there were developments that would have been headlines had his death not pushed the story to the bottom of the page. The PML-N has, seemingly, finally decided to get tougher with the PPP but is not yet prepared to challenge it by moving a vote of no confidence. The PML-N has announced a nine-point agenda for which it seeks government compliance, and the agenda comes attached to a 72-hour deadline (amended in the light of governor Taseer’s murder by three days to allow proper respects to be paid.) The other major party in the National assembly the PML-Q also held back from the no-confidence line in the dust; and there is a collective holding of breath and careful scrutiny of positions to see who is going to blink first.
There does not appear to be the political desire to oust the government, at least not yet, and space has been created for some high-speed horse-trading and the extraction of political concessions by the opposition from a government weakened by the decision of the MQM to sit on the opposition benches in the Centre. The prime minster has indicated that he may consider a reversal of the decision to raise petrol prices. Such an adjustment is a quick fix, and easier to fulfil than getting rid of corrupt officials, cutting back on government expenditure and appointing independent members to vacant seats on the election commission. These latter are rather more difficult to achieve than by the stroke of a pen, and the PML-N will doubtless have been aware of that when its demands were formulated. Breathing space is provided by a cushion of 45 days which the government has been given by PML-N to meet its demands – which takes us to February 20. After that, and if the government has failed to comply, the PML-N is saying it will put the same agenda to other opposition parties to see if consensus can be arrived at for a challenge to the government. Whatever happens, the government just saw its ‘wiggle room’ diminish significantly, and for the first time in the current crisis change may be on the horizon.