The Untraveled Road

The genie is out of the bottle. The cat is out of the bag. The bird is out of the cage. That is the story of the country and of public sentiment today. Meanwhile, the more you try to chase the genie, the cat, the bird, the further they move away from you. But this increasingly stark reality is not ringing a bell either in the country’s political corridors, or in the quarters of their power facilitators. Their responses are typical: the chase is on and persecution is at an all time high. The “forces” are using all the force they can muster to target the opposition. But in doing so, they are spurring the people to retaliate. And these people, the common man, are increasingly realising their own power.

Political parties conduct many types of protests. These include rallies, sit-ins and marches. Pakistani politics has a history of long marches by the opposition parties of the day. Benazir Bhutto led two main long marches. The first of these was in 1992 against the election allegedly rigged by Nawaz Sharif in 1990. President Ishaq Khan responded by dissolving the assembly, but the Supreme Court restored it. On July 16, 1993, Benazir Bhutto marched on the capital again, which was completely sealed by the Nawaz Sharif government. The situation was defused after the then army chief, Gen Waheed Kakar, forced President Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to resign. Those were the most impactful of the various long marches undertaken in the country over the years as far as getting results is concerned. The PTI is now undertaking its fourth long march. The first was in August 2014 against rigging in the 2013 elections, which resulted in a 126-day-long sit-in in Islamabad. The second was in 2017 against the Panama Leaks, which resulted in the Supreme Court taking up the case of Nawaz Sharif’s assets in the UK revealed in the Panama Leaks. The third march was on May 25, 2022, which was brutally dealt with by the PML-N government who beat, shelled and arrested marchers, forcing a postponement of the march.

Now the PTI has embarked on its fourth long march, which started on October 28, 2022. This is a march with a difference. Regardless of the result, the march has certain factors that set it apart and are the foundations of a successful march.

Firstly, this march has a different strategy. Normally a long march commences, continues for a few days, and then the marchers disband. The PTI 2014 long march continued for three days, followed by a long 126-day sit-in. Maulana Fazalur Rehman’s long march in October 2019 continued for a few days and was followed by a sit-in of 11 days in Islamabad. This PTI march has specific targets, times, dates, and places. Its route is set along GT road – once considered a PML-N stronghold. The plan to stop at what were PML-N hot spots and gather sympathetic people from surrounding reachable constituencies to collect there has worked very well. Hitherto politically uninvolved people and PML-N supporters are lured by the unprecedented size of the gathering crowds and their enthusiasm. Then these people are galvanised to join the march on its way to Islamabad. In the process, the new recruits and party workers and ticket holders get a chance to meet the leadership on the container. This is a definite draw, and ergo — record crowds wherever the caravan stops. And as the long march becomes longer, it starts playing on the nerves of the government and its exiled, travelling leaders, who are now holding press conferences being aired from London, aimed at stopping the march any way they can.

Secondly, this march has clarity of purpose as opposed to mere rhetoric. It is, in fact, this clarity of purpose that inspires people to go on this arduous and difficult journey. People do not want to know what to do as much as they want to know why to do it. The purpose of this march is freedom from the powerful who have trampled the powerless. The former include politicians, the establishment, foreign powers and in fact, the entire system which is geared to cater to the rich and powerful. So the purported purpose of the long march resonates with those who have been the victims of this system.

Thirdly, long marches need people who have the will, wherewithal and staying power to deal with the tough and demanding circumstances that are part and parcel of such undertakings. That requires a mass mobilisation exercise. There was a time when the PTI was a mainly middle-class party. Not so any longer. Alongside the container, among the sea of people moving from Liberty Lahore to GT Road, you see the rich and famous rubbing shoulders with the poor and disenfranchised, young firebrands with the aged and infirm, men, women and children … people on the road, sitting in trees, on housetops and in balconies, people chanting slogans, waving madly. And stories abound — of an old man running all the way from Lahore to Gujrat, women in wheelchairs insisting on joining the melee, hitherto apolitical people emerging from farms, shops, katchi abadis, endless, unforgettable scenes, endless people from disparate circumstances united only by a single purpose.

The visuals are awe-inspiring, but what is it about this march that is having this snowball effect, that has generated so much passion, resilience and energy?

Unemployment and inflation do unarguably bring people to the streets, but they are not enough to sustain such a long spell of resistance. What has happened is that the issue of basic human values such as freedom, justice, equality and equity that this march has raised, have turned it into a cause. This is a fight for freedom from the clutches of those at the helm, who are slaves of other countries and addicted to corruption. Research indicates that the sentence uttered by ImranKhan “ kya mein ghulam hoon, kya hum bhair bakrian hein?” ( Am I a slave, are we goats or sheep) has hit a raw nerve among the long-suppressed, brutalised people of this country. People are fighting for a restoration of human dignity and self-esteem.

This march may end in unintended consequences. The danger of an aware and awakened nation not being able to realise the dream of a free and fair society can result in anger which could be destructive and violent.

But whatever happens, there has been a big gain: the amazing awareness the public has been enriched by. The media, the establishment, the intellectuals and the institutions have all been exposed. Instead of bowing before power, the public is now bowing before the late Arshad Sharif. These are irreversible facts. Now the genie will not be bottled. It is finally willing to stand up and be counted.

The writer is a columnist, consultant, coach and an analyst