Blah Blah from The TeaBreak Team.

In a game of chess there are three possible ways of getting out of a check:

• Capturing the checking piece, with either the king or another piece.
• Moving the king to an adjacent square where it will not be in check.
• Blocking the check. This will only work if the checking piece is a queen, rook, or bishop and there is at least one empty square in the line between this checking piece and the checked king.

So far in the political chessboard of Pakistan, Nawaz Sharif has managed to exercise the second option to get out of Asif Zardari’s incessant and clever checks.

There exists an agreement among the analysts, journalists and the people of Pakistan that Asif Zardari is not governing the country but playing pure politics. There also exists the agreement that this is necessary for someone who was sidelined in the party by the chairperson and his own wife and that the best way to avoid threats from within the party and the aggression from opponents is to attack them. And there exists no doubt among all that Mr. Zardari is playing his cards, or making his moves, flawlessly.

I don’t intend to praise Mr. Zardari in this post for his masterful strokes, nor do I plan to vilify him with charges or corruption (despite the synonymous nature of the words Zardari and corruption).

After bringing Nawaz Sharif onboard (rather fooling him), forcing him to accept key ministries and then creating an environment where Mr. Sharif’s ministers pulled out of the cabinet giving an impression of casual attitude. This impression was further strengthened by the fact that Ishaq Dar came in to his office, did nothing, and left, leaving the economy in dire straits. Zardari used this opportunity to rightly (and nicely) portray an image that the PPP has been left alone to handle the mess.

Zardari placed men like Salman Taseer and Manzoor Wattoo to strike a deal with PML-Q, or at least create an impression of doing so. This brought out the wild kid inside Nawaz Sharif who publicly declared war against Zardari and himself tried to strike a deal with a faction of PML-Q. Again, the move fired back for Sharif brothers. In the mean time, PPP continued their public campaign of saying nice words for PML-N (apart from a few members).

An opportunity came for Nawaz Sharif when Zardari broke his public promise of restoring the CJP (something like breaking the public promise of shedding army uniform by the former president). Nawaz Sharif did seize on this and it was his turn to call check.

But who knew Zardari had more cards to play. Perhaps, there is a difference living in jail and exile. Jail makes a person tougher – exile (to avoid jail) doesn’t.

Zardari waited for Nawaz Sharif to carry on and gave him a chance to go overboard and then unleashed the case of Sharif brothers in the court. This was a masterful political move. With a firm control on judiciary and having given enough time to Nawaz Sharif to make public claims against the judges, judiciary and the government to an excessive extent, the President has now completely cornered the Sher of Punjab.

With the lawyers calling for Long March and dharna, PML-N is now slowly backtracking from their support for the lawyers. Why? Simple, because dharna can have devastating effects including the fall of the government (which the PPP is bragging about). Any participation by PML-N in such event will mean they were party to the collapse of government (which they may want but not so openly). However not taking part in it, they will be breaking ties with the lawyers’ movement which is the real cause for the support that PML-N currently enjoys.

Damned if you do doomed if you don’t – this precisely explains the current status of Nawaz Sharif. Is there a way out for PML-N? Or can Zardari now call checkmate?