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If crumbs doesn’t sound like a huge incentive, crumbs at the centre are a heck of a lot more attractive than the whole pie in Punjab.But why is Shahbaz suffering the backlash? If Shahbaz can’t wrest the party from Nawaz, then Shahbaz will line up behind Nawaz. Part of that could be family dynamics, and part a younger sibling’s lack of self-belief and suffocating tradition.But the possibility of Shahbaz dutifully falling in line behind Nawaz further complicates the already complicated original goal: purging Nawaz.But interest in the Shahbaz option has cooled.They want Nawaz out. And now it’s Shahbaz’s tu to suffer.A threat that Imran may think he’s more than able to handle electorally, but a threat that PTI does not necessarily look like it can defeat.Shahbaz’s entire pitch rested on that little detail: Imran somehow not being able to become what everything suggests he should already be — the favourite in August. Options in this game means relevance. We’ll know soon enough.

By arrangement with Dawn. It makes no sense for Shahbaz to go it alone and attempt a three-way fight in Punjab between Nawaz, Imran and himself.An on-time election being necessary for Shahbaz to line up the party behind him and pivot from an administrative role in Punjab to national politics. It’s just a question of finding it.Instead, he ordered an inquest into the few who were missing.For all the factions in the PML(N) — a south Punjab bloc is evident; there is the recent lining up behind pirs; and some bubbling in north and central Punjab, where a tough fight from the PTI is expected — the party is still a disceible whole.Has he really been cut loose?

Thrown under the bus before he could force his way into the driver’s seat?The Shahbaz camp insists that recent events are just a nudge.And, left unsaid, an on-time election allowing Shahbaz and Imran time to tear into each other, leaving neither with funny ideas of Wholesale Hex flange bolt Suppliers a runaway victory and what that could unleash. Here, though, is where the real ugliness and miserableness comes in.If Nawaz in trouble hasn’t caused enough of the N-League to bolt from his camp, then maybe Nawaz and Shahbaz both in trouble may do the trick.The swing vote — everyone else has had a chance, so why not Imran? — will probably go Imran’s way the next time round, but the deficit to the PML(N) from 2013 is significant.For small mercies we must be grateful. Why?The preferred scheme of replacement was relatively straightforward.The problem is Shahbaz hasn’t been able to step out of Nawaz’s shadow. When a significant majority of N-League parliamentarians did, Nawaz didn’t feel the need to thank them profusely or throw some gifts their way.The cautious confidence of the Nawaz camp can be gauged from the recent parliamentary vote that Nawaz needed the full party to tu up for. At this point, in a rigged game, Imran has to be the favourite. The PML(N) had tried to scoop up chunks of the PPP’s collapsing vote bank in Punjab by trying to drag at least the perception of the PML(N) to the centre. More get-on-with-it than you’re-done.The wily Zardari has sensed this and made the appropriate move.But the dismantling of the N-League and the rise of frightening options on the ultra right may send the PPP voter scampering back. First Hudaibiya, now Model Town — it’s been a rough patch for the younger Sharif. And if Nawaz can’t be purged, then the PML(N) — all of it — is a threat. And that whole is still leaning on Nawaz.And yet, there is no great enthusiasm apparent for Imran — neither in the electorate nor among the ones fashioning the restructuring.Carving up the state, as it were.

It keeps the pressure on the N-League and leaves the PPP with options. No longer. Shahbaz would wrest the party from Nawaz and a rejuvenated and rebooted PML(N) would take on Imran in an on-time election.Allying with the nutty preacher from abroad may be the cleverest thing Zardari has done in a while. Shahbaz’s potential was obvious enough: he would convince the boys that he could convince the PML(N) to line up behind him, accept a diminished role for Nawaz and, of course, not fight with the boys. So a little massaging is in order.

A story of confidence retuing. Once upon a time, there was a delicate dance around whether there’s a purge ongoing or not. Which still leaves us with the question of Shahbaz.Imran, it is clear, needs help. Either way, strap yourself in for a rocky 2018.Dismantling the N-League still leaves the question of what to replace it with. And relevance is just about the best the PPP can hope for right now.But most of it is likely political: wresting the party from Nawaz has proved harder than was anticipated.After all, the N-League’s winning and competitive candidates all have a breaking point.So why not prise away the N-League’s right-wing support, fuse together some of the old and the new, rising vote banks on the ultra right, and present it to the PTI as an ally? Y’know, to get Imran across the finish line. Everything the boys want for the boys, the bits of goveance left over for Shahbaz and whoever lined up behind him. But Nawaz is clinging on and the cost of ousting him is increasing. That tells its own story.