THERE is no end to the bad news a government in Pakistan gets, and PTI is proving to be no different.

Last week, its share of woes included the dismissal of Jahangir Tareen Khan’s review petition from the Supreme Court. He had been disqualified earlier by the court, but his review petition had been pending. However, that too has been dismissed now, leaving him disqualified for life — a decision which should give PTI (like PML-N) the impetus to get rid of the constitutional clause allowing lifetime disqualification of politicians.

But there is little hope that the parties will get their act together, as the decision was openly celebrated by some opposition parties (as others had done when Nawaz Sharif had been similarly struck out). And it can be safely ventured that the judgement allowed many within PTI to smile behind closed doors as well.

JKT (as he is called) has gained considerable fame for his closeness to PTI head Imran Khan. Tareen first gained political fame during the Musharraf period, but was adrift (along with many others) as the general lost his uniform and his grip over PML-Q. Before the 2013 elections, when the PTI was attracting considerable attention with its mammoth jalsas, Tareen amid a host of others from PML-Q joined Khan and his quest for a new Pakistan. And it wasn’t long before he became the only recognisable face among the group who jumped onboard; does anyone even remember who else joined the party then?

Chances are that Jahangir Tareen will continue to play a key role in the PTI government at all levels.

His aeroplane has acquired legendary status in the analyses of PTI and Imran Khan’s politics and his war with Shah Mehmood Qureshi has acquired a fame akin to the Montague-Capulet rivalry. In fact, shortly after the dismissal of his petition, there was many an analysis of how this would work to the advantage of SMQ, as there were predictions about the end of JKT’s political career.

Both these assumptions are incorrect.

There is no doubt that the disqualification of JKT has been a harsh blow — there are few who don’t believe that he would have been the first choice of Khan for the chief ministership of Punjab, a position the importance of which could not be underestimated till Usman Buzdar was placed there. And had he not wanted Takht-i-Lahore, JKT would probably have his choice of responsibilities at the centre.

Indeed, the disqualification has robbed him of his chance to play a public and official role in the making of ‘naya Pakistan’. The enormity cannot be downplayed. But he is not out, despite being down.

Neither can his stature in the party be compared to other PTI stalwarts — including SMQ. Perhaps the closest the two came to an equal tug of war was in the award of tickets for south Punjab as both had different preferences. Qureshi looked at former PPP men as possible contenders; while for Tareen, those he had interacted with at PML-Q were better choices. The Ahmed Hussain Dehar and Sikander Hayat Bosan back-and-forth in Multan was a case in point. JKT preferred Bosan as they had both been part of PML-Q; but Qureshi was rooting for Dehar who had spent time in PPP.

But beyond this, the influence of the two in the party cannot be compared.

The chief ministership of Punjab is one example. The chances of Khan making Qureshi the Punjab chief minister were never very high except in the minds of those who create this false equivalence. This much is evident from the post Qureshi ended up with in the federal cabinet: for a party focused on reforms and least concerned with foreign policy (it is said Khan had to be pushed to visit Saudi Arabia), the foreign ministry portfolio is hardly a key one.

On the other side, JKT will most probably be closely involved in the reform and change agenda; he has already been in the eye of a (small) storm for attending a meeting on agriculture according to this paper. SMQ wasn’t around — even though he too can be expected to know a thing or two about agriculture!

Our new foreign minister was never heard to play a role in PTI’s efforts in KP after the 2013 poll. But Tareen was there. There was news about organisations linked to him doing work in the health sector, for instance, and when angry MPAs lashed out at PTI, the secretary general was rarely spared!

Does any of this indicate that SMQ has the confidence of the new prime minister and PTI head honcho as does Tareen? How difficult would it have been for SMQ to contest a provincial by-election to the Punjab Assembly had Khan been so inclined. Instead, an unknown name was elevated to the biggest position in the province, and Aleem Khan, who according to reports is part of the JKT camp, was made senior minister and given local governments, the big item in the reform agenda. And let’s not forget that it was Tareen who brought Muhammad Salman, the man who defeated Qureshi in the provincial election, into the party, much to the unhappiness of Qureshi. (Salman was disqualified on Monday.)

Chances are that JKT will continue to play a key role in the PTI government at all levels, his disqualification notwithstanding. And those who want to condemn PTI will continue to name and shame, even as the critics of PML-N lash out at Nawaz Sharif’s involvement in politics.

But all of this simply highlights a singular issue — we have to stop expecting legal decisions to change politics; this is not possible. Political personalities, be it those whom people vote for (Nawaz Sharif), or those who are close to political leaders (Jahangir Tareen) cannot be stopped or made irrelevant by ‘disqualifications’. Only the people’s votes or the decision-making structures within political parties can do this. Law cannot trump politics, nor should we expect it to provide the solutions that are ideally the domain of democratic processes. Ziaul Haq also had similar ideas about PPP, and look how wrong he turned out to be.

The writer is a journalist.

Published in Dawn, October 2nd, 2018