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Abdullah Ahmed
16110069
SS-100
Ms. Rabiya Hafeez
25th March 2013

The private lives of politicians should be off limits. The focus should remain entirely
on their performance in the public arena.

Politics and media both are very powerful, influential and impactful tools to manipulate
common peoples mind. Both tools, when played dirty, can have a disastrous effect on the society
as a whole. Unfortunately, in Pakistan, both the politics and the media are used to spread ill will,
hostility and hatred in the society. On one hand politicians keep on playing the ethnic cards for
their personal benefit to gather votes for elections. On the other hand, they exploit media to
spread rumors against the opposing politicians to destroy their vote bank. In this scenario, what
certain politicians do is that they start defaming each other by passing derogatory remarks on
their personal lives, and then make illogical assumptions out of them about their ability to deliver
in the field of politics. Although personal life of a politician may reflect a part of his personality,
however, it should not be associated with his professional life and his ability to perform because
personal life of a politician is not a standard to determine his flair for politics and his personality
cannot be judged merely by a single event of his life.
Personal life and professional life of a politician are two separate entities. A politicians
affiliation with the public and his aptitude for leading a country cannot be judged by his personal

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life matters. For instance, Imran khan was defamed during the election campaign because Nawae-Waqt published his affairs with Susannah Constantine and Lady Liza Campbell to destroy his
popularity. Even if it was true, it should not have been linked with his performance in the field of
politics. His personal life should not be criticized by the religious leaders of Pakistan as what he
has done in his private life does not depict his passion for politics and patriotism with the
country. Rather than looking at it from this point of view, we should think about what he has
achieved for our country. He won the cricket world cup for Pakistan which shows his ability to
lead and motivate. Secondly his achievement towards improving Pakistan should be taken into
consideration. Everyone criticized that a cancer hospital could not be made in Pakistan with
funds in hand; however Imran khan was able to achieve it. Shaukat Khanum memorial hospital is
now treating cancer patients with an annual budget of over 5.8 billion rupees. Thus, a politicians
personal life affairs should not be considered to analyze his ability to perform for the public.
Moreover, a politicians popularity could be seen by the character assessment done by the
general public; how much are they willing to support the leader. For example, Imran Khan was
able to mobilize the youth during his political rallies. Imran khan proved that the youth and
educated class of Pakistan are with him and it could be clearly seen by an attendance of over a
hunded thousand people at Minar-e-Pakistan Lahore. Even though PML N had a strong control
over the region, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf managed to pull up a huge crowd. So it should be left
for the general public to decide about the leaders performance while his personal life should be
set aside for evaluation of his skills.
Furthermore, politicians always try to step up on issues to prove their point by blaming
other politicians of corruption and theft. For example, Zardari is often called Mr. 10% and is
accused of various crimes including corruption, kidnapping and murders. None of the cases have

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been proved to be correct thus calling him by such a name destroys his image. Therefore, focus
should be on his political performance and what he has done for the country and not on the
accusations. A politician must not be judged on mere charges as it is a flawed basis of evaluation.
Another aspect of the argument is that the personality of a politician cannot be assessed
by a single life event. Hence establishing various assumptions about a politician based on a
single life event is totally illogical. For instance, Imran Khans marriage with a foreigner lady
Jemima is always viewed with despise by the opposing groups. Marriage is one of the most
private matters of a person and passing remarks on it is not only illogical but also immoral. Also,
associating marital life with professional life is a false basis of assessment. Imran Khan later
divorced Jemima which is again taken in a very negative sense by certain analysts and people.
They claim that if he cannot manage his marital life properly then how can he manage the whole
country? Again, this is an illiterate approach towards politics. A single life event cannot be
generalized over his entire personality. It is unwise to associate a personal life event with a
politicians professional life. However, a single event in a politicians political life must be
considered for evaluation as he is accountable for his actions in public.
In contrast to this, proponents of personal life assessment of a politician assert that
personal life and professional life of a politician are interconnected. They claim that personal life
events of a politician reflect his true personality and character. Thus personal life of a politician
is an important tool that can depict the true face of a politician. This is not true. Personal life and
single event of a politicians life only reflects a part of his personality. Moreover, this part of
personality is also not at all important as far as his professional life is concerned. That part of
personality may be very important for his personal life but for his political life, the only thing
that matters is his performance. For instance, Sheikh Rasheed is pin pointed for not marrying. He

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is often associated with saying, If you get milk from the market the why keep a cow at home?.
This is his personal point of view about his private life. This should not be put up publically as it
is viewed by most of the analysts as a very negative aspect of his personality. A politician should
only be judged by his attributes, whether he is committed, sincere, honest and fit for the job. And
also, is he willingly fulfilling what he is supposed to do? Personal life affairs must be kept
separate for true evaluation of a politician and the nation must not indulge in frivolous matters of
the politician as they give a wrong picture of a politicians passion for the public and ability to
deliver.
Summarizing it all, it could be asserted that politicians private life should be kept aside
from their professional life as it is not a measure of their actual aptitude. Their acts or behavior
with their families and other affairs do not specify their true nature and personality and thus we
should only focus on their political career; how well were they able to serve the nation, their
achievements in the form of statistics or international relations. Likewise, One-time event should
not be related to them, calling them with names like Maulana Diesel for Maulana Fazal-urRehman or Taliban Khan for Imran Khan. This does not only create a stereotype but also
defame a country internationally as we pin point and criticize our own politicians who act as
ambassadors abroad, defaming our own nation. For betterment of people and to improve the
image of our people we should not focus on the negatives and should try to forget about the
mistakes done in the past. We should focus on the opportunities we have in future and try to
attain them with full commitment and honesty to make a better nation.