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Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Pakistan's First Twitter Prime Minister

After heated election campaigns, fiery tweets, anxious pleas and rigging complaints the first elections for Pakistan Twitter Parliament concluded. No member got a clear majority to win the elections, a time of 24 hours was awarded to announce coalitions and gain maximum number of votes to form government.

After much making and breaking, confusion, queries and questions the coalitions were announced. Tweeple Scorpioyas was declared the first ever Prime Minister of Pakistan Twitter parliament with coalition partners AbidBeli, NaeemShamim, Omair_Khalid and Rectified_guy with total vote count of 595 votes. The other coalition is now in opposition with BonBonDude as Leader of Opposition and members Kursed and Guppu, a total vote count of 370. This is Pakistan’s first virtual Prime Minister after the more successful Musharraf's Facebook President episode, effectively forming the virtual leadership of the country.

With a Prime Minister in place the process of appointing Ministers began as interested Tweeples were contacted and word was spread to file nominations for ministries. One Tweeple, IrfanQazi2010, was interested in the ministry of Nepotism, Corruption, Misgovernance, Misinformation and Injustice. He was conveniently ignored.

Tweeple AadilPitafi formed Facebook page for Pakistan Twitter Parliament and in short time it was liked by more than 100 people, showing effective Twitter and Facebook marketing and general audience interest in this unique twitter phenomenon. The first issue Parliament faced was the use of non-Parliamentary language which was effectively explained as “too tarakh” language and banning its use during session. It simply means if you are using #PKTP in your tweet, don’t be frank as “chaddi friends” because while parliament is in session, no one wants to be in his “Chaddi”.

Self-proclaimed President abidifactor ended up arguing in every which direction with the opposition leader who questioned everything, from neutrality to presidential voting and finally an offer of vote of confidence in return for a week of neutrality along with general reminder that they’re not friendly opposition; meanwhile Prime Minster kept banging his head in choosing Chief Justice, COAS and ministers and the first appointment came in the form of Deputy Speaker and Tweeple ShaikhRafia was awarded with this position.

Later on rumors spread that Prime Minister has already set out on his first Virtual Foreign tour (to Pakistan it seemed, since he physically resides outside the country), probably wasting much of new Parliament’s virtual money on Swiss accounts, buying castles and hotels, gambling in Casinos and acquiring personal jumbo jets … all virtual (obviously). It is yet to determine the extent of accuracy of these rumors and possible virtual expenditure; meanwhile self-proclaimed President, Bureaucrat, Intelligence Agency, Media and Establishment abidifactor continued to facilitate the curious visitors and agitating opposition.

Twitter Parliament faced its first crisis when member abidbeli threatened to leave coalition and join the opposition. After much hyper tweeting by concerned members and constant poking, it was announced that the coalition is still intact and abidbeli decided to stay with the government. Then Prime Minister showed up and announced that any problem should be directly discussed with him and not left to speculations.

As of yet the ministries are not complete and preparations for Presidential elections are underway which will be held in coming days. The #PKTP daily has some interesting insights that would give general information regarding Twitter Parliament updates every 24 hours.

7 comments:

Ammar Faheem said...

There should have been some say about the monarchy experiment #KTPak (The Kingdom of Pakistan on Twitter) as well. It takes the idea of #PKTP to another level.

Sana Khalid said...

Haphazard it may seem but it is by far one of the best initiatives ever taken online for Pakistan. Amateurish you may call it, but it has a vision and it will one day be a part of something big. Yes criticism is welcomed however cynicism is not.

tAALz said...

I would like to have the Ministry of Gender Discrimination :D

Umair Munawwer said...

Well I also wanna be part of this parliament.

Unknown said...

we still need ppl for health . Interested one contact @omair_khalid on twitter.

I`ll also take in account IrfanQazi2010 , will discuss him about his intentions to facilitate the cause.

Unknown said...

And Mr. Abbasi,gratitude for you for this immense following of the #PKTP and conveying to the rest one with splendorous manner .

W.A.K.A said...

@ Ammar Faheem

I was caught up with some work so couldn't work things out. Inshallah I will write another blog entry this week and include #KTPak as well.

@ Sana Khalid

Agreed on Cynicism point. I wrote this blog, accounting the events in chronological manner and didn't want the reading experience to be that of regular staff reporters. That is why it's a mix blend of regular blog and Ansar Abbasi style writing, to make it more fun to read for an outsider.

@ tAALz

Contact Prime Minister, maybe he has some plans for you :)

@ umair

Same advice, contact Prime Minister :)

@ Omair Khalid

The following will continue. I declined to take part in elections because I wanted to cover the whole event. Unfortunately I have been busy since Presidential elections and haven't been able to take out time for new blog. I will write one this week Inshallah to cover the happenings of Presidential elections of #PKTP.

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