ANTICIPATING an election always enriches the horizon with a fascinating mosaic.

Long before the words are registered the colours representing various political parties sufficiently convey the message. The more aware among us do not need any formal confirmation of who is going to take up what role. Once a survey of banners and a count of party flags has been carried out, banner readers can confidently declare who is going to hold which office and where.

The banners faithfully hailing the party leaders for their feats and promise are being fast unfurled now, boasting some old names and often acting as an expression of a newcomer’s aspiration for recognition by his party.

It is remarkable how frequently a person who spends a fistful on eulogising the chosen leader does eventually achieve the objective — a nomination for vote to the assemblies or the honour of holding a party office, or some less conspicuous but equally befitting reward.

There is nothing more potent than effusive, persistent praise to tug at the leader’s heartstrings. This results in generous favours to a truly celebrated follower.

This exercise must be carried out in full public view for everyone’s benefit. Thus, the aspiring banners are quite often the first clue to a future and a fortune which may take a while to unfold. Those who spend less on the billboards are less likely to be noticed by the party leadership and may forever exist in oblivion.

Take Abdul Aleem Khan who has just been elected as the president of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf’s Lahore chapter. The man is known to spend to his heart’s content once he picks up a campaign. Not exactly a veteran politician nor yet what you would call a star, he has already fought a few assembly elections, and is known to have fought them quite lavishly.

A remnant of the group discovered during Gen Pervez Musharraf’s new leadership, Aleem Khan kept his entry into the PTI quiet. As an old associate of the dictator he did not want to antagonise the reformers in PTI. This method was necessary since controversy that could surround the crossover was best avoided in case of a party which is avowedly pursuing the overhaul of the system.

Following this rather ‘unceremonious’ entry and the period of acclimatisation, the effort would have gone waste without the protagonist arriving at a point where it was necessary for the aspirant to show his presence.

When the moment did finally come it coincided with a series of billboards installed at strategic points. These sought to build up the image of Mr Aleem Khan, we now know, as the city leader of the PTI, and also most probably as a candidate for an assembly seat.

Banners have this habit of inviting more banners — complementary and often competing. The large-size pictures of Aleem Khan and members of his group invited others within the PTI to follow suit. These also intimidated the party’s opponents. It heralded a war of banners outside the intra-party competition that Aleem Khan faced.

From outside the PTI, the followers of the Pakistan Muslim League-N, in many cases aspirants striving to catch the eye of the PML-N leadership, emerged to confront the campaign by Aleem Khan and his other party colleagues, aiming to create space for themselves.

As the holders of the title, the N-League members had to of course overwhelm the challenger, with even larger signboards that gave evidence of the PML-N’s dominance over Lahore. The election could be some time away but in the meanwhile no one is to be given an impression that the champions are weak and vulnerable.

Since colours do have this habit of making words superfluous and redundant, over time, a certain meaning has been invested in the calm, un-agitating green that the PML-N is recognised by. It is a single-tone, matter-of-fact sign that goes well with the image of its leader, Mian Nawaz Sharif.

An art critic would perhaps elaborate that Nawaz’s comparatively less exciting style, which puts a premium on earnestness rather than charisma to win elections, lends a particular kind of sobriety to his party’s colour — rather than it being the other way round.

In any case, with the election-symbol tiger roaring and the faces from the expanding Sharif clan in various moods present in the foreground, the PML-N’s green continues to be a less exciting, earnest and steadier competitor. The more vivid, flashy part, as always, is reserved for its rival — a new one here by all signs.

It is intriguing that for all the effort that it makes to appear different from the Pakistan Peoples Party, the PTI’s choice of shades to flaunt on the Lahore roads bears an uncanny resemblance to the PPP’s colour scheme.

To appear busy and more purposeful than the dull green of the PML-N, the PTI advertisers often go beyond their own three official colours of white green and red to include the black as an additional choice.

This PTI adoption of the red, green and black combination is far more noticeable everywhere, except for the small stretch around the governor’s house where the PPP appears to be meekly trying to assert its claims on the party’s old three-colour scheme.

It seems as if the advertisers in Lahore have been ill-prepared to give the PTI’s campaign a tone truly its own, and have chosen to show it in the bright, vivid hues traditionally worn by the PPP in aid of its effort to be known as an entity comprising diverse people.

A more profound explanation could be that, more unwitting than by design, these colours in their own way tell the same story about the PPP’s replacement with the PTI as the main challenger to the PML-N’s domination of politics here.

The writer is Dawn’s resident editor in Lahore.