Balance sheet Pakistan has witnessed a historic moment. At the stroke of midnight on Saturday, the democratically elected National Assembly, having completed its term of five years (a first for Pakistan), stood automatically dissolved. The country now stands poised to complete another first, a democratic transition from one elected government to the next. Despite the temporary hiccups regarding the process of selecting a consensus caretaker prime minister and chief ministers in some provinces, the transition process as laid down in the constitution has enough failsafe layers to ensure successful completion. Looking back over the past five years of the PPP-led coalition government at the Centre, it must be admitted that even after discounting the bias of the lobby that has a visceral hatred of the PPP, there is much room for discontent and relatively little to show in terms of achievement. This is not to say that those achievements do not have their own importance and weightage, only that the mountain of problems the government has left behind as a legacy means this is what will remain in public memory, rather than the positives. So how does the balance sheet of the last five years of democracy pan out? First, the positives. The government continued to claim almost throughout its tenure the milestones of the National Finance Commission (NFC) Award, the ‘restoration’ of the 1973 constitution through the 18th Amendment, and its success in completing its five year tenure because of the policy of reconciliation first enunciated by late Benazir Bhutto. The NFC Award through consensus empowered the provinces financially by increasing their share of the federal divisible pool. The 18th Amendment abolished the concurrent list (much after it was intended, but better late than never) and transferred all the subjects in it to the provinces. On the one hand this lightened the top heavy structure of the federal government, on the other it gave at least the potential to the provincial governments to manage far more than before, although it must be admitted that they still have some way to go before it can be claimed that they have realized that potential fully. Nevertheless, the change is permanent and struck a long overdue blow for provincial autonomy against a historically overcentralised state structure. It is now for future provincial governments to grasp the historic opportunity they have been presented with. The policy of reconciliation allowed the PPP to attract and keep with it diverse coalition partners such as the MQM, ANP and PML-Q, even after the PML-N quit the coalition in 2008 over the issue of restoration of the superior judiciary. The PPP has been surprisingly modest regarding its toleration of unrelenting criticism, not all of it justified or free of bias and vested interest, from the by now free and powerful media. Such a record of toleration for five years is also a first for any government in Pakistan. Additionally, the PPP government did not properly air another feather in its cap: not one political prisoner or falsely implicated in cases political rival over these five years. Those familiar with the dark history of such repression in Pakistan’s history will appreciate the historic turn towards a democratic culture that this development implies. Having said all this, it must be stated that the five years of the PPP government leaves behind a great deal of debris in the shape of the people’s discontent. The management of the economy, admittedly under strain because of the global recession, domestic terrorism and breakdown of law and order, and above all the energy crisis, has taken its toll in terms of low growth, rising unemployment and inflation, and the increasing inability of millions of the poor to make ends meet, with welfare projects such as the Benazir Income Support Programme unable to help more than a few thousand families in a sea of spreading penury. The PPP government’s manifest failure to curb terrorism, which incrementally has spread through the length and breadth of the country, impacted all aspects of national life in profound ways, raising insecurity, creating a climate of lawlessness in which crime flourished, and dragging the economy further into the doldrums. Failures and discontents notwithstanding, the outgoing government and the people deserve a pat on the back for completing a democratically elected government’s tenure, with hope in a future of better things to come so long as the country stays on the path of democracy and freedom, with at least the potential for expanding the delivery of political, economic and social rights to the people.