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Rural Vs Urban Political Divide In Pakistan

By Sikander Hayat



Long March was an unmitigated success for all Pakistanis from Khyber to Karachi and it showed in their reaction to the speech made by the prime minister Yusuf Raza Gillani.

At the same time some people like Fazal-Ur-Rehman tried to give the impression that a party from Punjab (PML(N)) is trying to force the hand of a party from Sindh. We all know that it was a vile accusation as this was a movement started by lawyers from all parts of the country and PML ( N) was just one of many parties which were part of the Long March. Keeping that in mind, I still think that enemies of Pakistan can utilise this lack of a party ( which has a universal appeal in all parts of the country and which contest elections on issues not the ethnicity) and harm us in future.




We need a party which has an equal influence in all four provinces of Pakistan because currently PPP has become a party of Sindh and PML(N) has become a party of Punjab.

Imran Khan looks promising but he is good at agenda setting ( he started the Tehreek-e-Insaaf) but has so far failed to materialise into a potent electoral force. PML (N) is currently perceived as a party which represents just Punjab, although its resistance to the foreign meddling in Pakistani affairs is making it a popular party in Pakhtunkhwa but how it will turn it into votes remains to be seen.




In a long drawn out process during the 1990s, PPP lost Punjab to PML (N) and became a party which had the power base in Sindh Province where increasingly MQM is also a force to be reckoned with.



Today’s Pakistan has turned into two political blocks ,the rural Pakistan & the urban Pakistan with its political map as follows:






1. Urban Punjab is a strong hold of PML (N)

2. Rural Punjab is controlled by PPP & PML (Q)



3. Urban Sindh, especially Karachi & Hyderabad have been conquered by MQM

4. Rural Sindh is the bastion of PPP

5. Urban Pakhtunkhwa is dominated by ANP/ PPP



6. Rural Pakhtunkhwa is under the influence of various religious parties

7. Balochistan’s situation is a little different as it votes on the basis of one tribal chief against the other thus resulting in a different outcome in every general election with the same faces getting elected through different parties.




It is very interesting to see this divide as it clearly shows that urban populations vote on the basis of issue whereas the rural politics have deep seated tribal bias which surfaces at the time of every election. There are number of reasons why that happens but the most important ones are as follows:



1. Urban populations in Pakistan tend to be more educated than their rural counterparts



2. In rural areas of Pakistan, one tribe or clan dominates a certain geographical area, so at election time only a member of that clan could get into the parliament where as urban areas tend to be cosmopolitan in nature

3. Courts in Urban areas have relatively better chance of dispensation of justice whereas rural areas courts are dominated by nepotism and clannish behaviour



4. Urban areas tend to be more apposed to a military takeover while rural populations remain ambivalent to any change in the political structure of the country. This started from the colonial times when the British gave land to powerful tribes in Punjab & Sindh to buy their loyalty and made the feudal lords their agents in the respective areas to control the local populations. This is exactly what military governments do and they have been very successful in keeping the rural areas quite whereas this same strategy never works in urban areas of Pakistan.

Comments

  1. we belong to a dead nation our political culture is the core product of our real values. our political leadership as you mentioned belong to jokers and they are basically touts. there is only one party have real democracy and values that is Jamat e Islami, but their thought to serve the nation is against out real manifesto.

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