An Overview of our Political Parties

Rahimia Magazine (October, 2014)

Development and progress of any country is closely related with the quality, sincerity and struggle of its political and intellectual leadership. In most of the countries, nationalist parties which fought the war of independence against colonialist powers got the opportunity to govern their country. However, it is very unfortunate that parties that happened to rule our country had no considerable participation in the national freedom struggle. In all national issues, policies and actions of these parties benefited imperialist powers and damaged national interests. These parties can be classified into three types namely political, religious and reformist parties. Most recently, another type of parties is introduced in the society with the rhetorical slogans of “Revolution” and “New Pakistan”. With the ever-increasing awareness against conventional political, religious and reformist parties, introduction of these new parties is aimed to engage and divert attention of Pakistanis from the real issues. In this article, we shall discuss only the first type i.e. political parties of our country.

Political leadership in our country belongs to different classes. One of these classes constitutes of feudal lords and its roots trace back to the feudalism established by British rule in the subcontinent. The other class comprises of capitalists and industrialists. Their background is also highlighted by those families which were assisted and obliged by our imperialist rulers. Our political leadership still includes the children of British army personnel and ‘Nawabs’ who remained faithful to colonialism.

These feudal and industrialist classes inherited the art of using politics for the attainment of imperialist objectives in our region. Even today, our political parties compete relentlessly against each other in order to prove their loyalty and services to their western masters. Ultimately, politics in our era is lacking morality and ethics. Compromising on all principles and an opportunistic mindset to gain vested interests are the hallmarks of our politics. These parties exploit state institutions, authority and resources for their class interests, expansion of their personal business enterprises and strengthening of their future generations. All these political parties are different power brokers of our present system which are either in government or opposition according to their turns. In spite of their apparent differences, they are always in accord and consensus whenever there is any threat to the authority and hegemony of elite class.

Political culture of any society thrives from its collective consciousness. The deeper the collective consciousness of any nation is rooted, the more stable, beneficial and participatory will its political culture be. Our political parties are completely devoid of any consciousness related to our national and collective betterment.Moreover, our national politics lacks all sort of ethics and morals. Consequently, culture of these political parties is developed by elements such as selfishness, exploitation, ethnic and regional segregation and economic class system. It is thus imperative upon us to accelerate our efforts to awake and harness collective consciousness of our society for national progress and betterment.

Translation: Muhammad Usman, Faisalabad