“I can’t understand this obsession with a narrative.” “Hmmmm, in any case the diehard supporters of political leaders don’t care if their leader’s wealth increased subsequent to their being declared the crown prince…”

“Or princess, don’t forget Notification Maryam Nawaz (NMN) whose competitor Sanam Javed is not being allowed to contest…”

“Two things my friend – first, Sanam Javed is not even a close competitor when one considers the far from intangible inheritance of NMN.”

“Right and in the Sharif family inheritance becomes due well before the death of the patriarch, right?”

“Right to ensure that no one challenges postmortem, anyway, while Brother Shehbaz has been toeing and froing from Karachi, seeking seat adjustment with the lightweight brigades…”

“You mean MQM, the Raja Riaz gang members, the GDA, the…”

“Yes that poor guy is seeking adjustments with all the King’s men and all the King’s horses in Sindh while NMN will stand from 5 safe seats in Punjab – safe after candidates approved by The Man Who Must Remain Nameless have been ousted from the running.”

“Hey one election, one team leader, another election, another, anyway who were you referring to when you said supporters don’t care if their leaders can’t explain a significant rise in wealth after becoming the crown prince. Why crown prince?”

“Well if our history is anything to go by a prime minister is a crown prince never a king – a king has powers and these guys don’t – not in the assembly as leader of the house, not in the, shall we say, decisions taken in the cabinet they chair which relate to the stakeholders, not in the…”

“And yet they have all managed to become richer. It’s a miracle!”

“Don’t be facetious anyway, the narrative I was talking about was not this obsession on the airwaves that the PML-N lacks a narrative in the forthcoming elections because the diehard supporters will vote for their leader come what may. The swing voters will look at the past performance not at their current narrative, and frankly I reckon the swing voters may opt to stay at home…”

“I agree.”

“Anyway, I was trolling the assassinated leader Benazir Bhutto’s past statements and stumbled on one statement where she said she didn’t want to be referred to as Bi Bi because that epithet is associated with an uneducated woman and I know why you are laughing.”

“Indeed you do as, The Third Wife is quite comfortable with the epithet Bi Bi after her name.”

“Just for the record, you know that BB was used to refer to Benazir Bhutto – her initials.”

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024