By Imran Malik | Business & Accountability Desk | MediaBites.com.pk
Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) is heading into the most fiercely contested election in its history but both groups are fighting with language that is embarrassing Pakistan’s business community.
The Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry is preparing for the biggest election in its history. What it is not preparing for is dignity.
Both competing groups have adopted a language so charged, so local and so unbecoming of a premier business institution that educated businessmen associated with LCCI are openly embarrassed. The atmosphere outside Lahore’s most important commercial body currently resembles a Punjabi film set more than the election of Pakistan’s leading chamber of commerce.
PIAAF Fights to Hold Its Fort
Mian Anjum Nisar’s group PIAAF is fighting with everything it has to prevent any crack in what has been its stronghold for years. But cracks are appearing — and some of the most visible ones are self-inflicted.
Ali Hassam Asghar, who was once considered Anjum Nisar’s own political child, was sidelined before the election even began, triggering voices of dissent from multiple directions.
More critically, the PIAAF campaign appears to be running on one engine. Anjum Nisar himself is visible and active. But many businessmen do not yet know who PIAAF’s presidential candidate actually is. The candidate has no independent voice. No distinct agenda. No public presence that stands apart from the patron.
The current LCCI President Faheem ur Rehman Saigol — the outgoing face of the Anjum Nisar group — is well known for meetings, tours and signing MOUs. What he could not deliver before this election was five concrete initiatives that would have given PIAAF something tangible to run on. Something to show the business community beyond handshakes and documents.
PIAAF is now running this election on reputation alone. And reputation without results is a shrinking asset.
Ali Hassam Asghar — Momentum Without Message
The opposition has its own strength. Ali Hassam Asghar’s candidacy has gained significant momentum through the support of Mian Misbah ur Rehman and other major group alliances, making this a genuinely competitive contest rather than a predetermined outcome.
But Ali Hassam faces the same problem from the other side. He has not placed two or three clear agenda points before the LCCI community. What will he do for Lahore’s business community? What problems will he solve? What outcomes can the chamber expect in the first six months of his leadership?
Without answers to those questions, the opposition is also running on alliances and group loyalties rather than vision.
Both sides are fighting on the strength of factions. Neither side is fighting on the strength of ideas.
The Language That Is Destroying the Election’s Credibility
Here is the most important, and most uncomfortable, observation.
The language being used by both groups in this election campaign has dismantled whatever institutional dignity the LCCI election process once carried. Every educated businessman who follows LCCI affairs and who should be the chamber’s most engaged constituent is instead expressing disappointment at what this election has become.
When the language of a chamber election becomes indistinguishable from the language of a local ward council election, something fundamental has been lost. LCCI is not a ward council. It is Pakistan’s most influential provincial chamber of commerce, a body that shapes policy, advocates for the business community before government, and represents Lahore’s commercial interests nationally and internationally.
It deserves an election campaign that matches that stature.
A Special Appeal to Mian Abu Zar
MediaBites makes a direct appeal to Mian Abu Zar and the elder statesmen of Lahore’s business community.
This election needs guardians of decency. People whose standing in the business community is sufficient to demand that both camps return to substance, civility, and professionalism.
If the LCCI election continues on its current trajectory, there will be no meaningful difference between a chamber election and a councilor election. And that is a loss not just for one group or one candidate — it is a loss for every businessman in Lahore who needs a credible, respected, and functional chamber fighting for their interests.
The election is close. The stakes are high. The language must change. Before it is too late.
— Imran Malik | Business and Accountability Desk | MediaBites.com.pk | Sharjahnews.ae
