Third screening in Season of World Cinema at RPC

Research and Publication Centre (RPC) in collaboration with Filmbar (on Instagram) announces the screening of the third film in its Season of World Cinema: Asghar Farhadi's 'The Salesman' (2016).

Amateur actors Emad and Rana prepare for opening night of their production of Arthur Miller's play Death of a Salesman. However, when the couple is forced to change apartments quickly when their building almost crumbles, a case of mistaken identity sees a shocking incident throw their lives into turmoil.

Timing: Friday, January 13, 2023, 5:00 pm at Research and Publication Centre (RPC), 2nd floor, 65 Main Boulevard Gulberg, Lahore (next to Standard Chartered Bank, above Indesign showroom).

Rashed Rahman

Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)

The December 2022 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out

The December 2022 issue of Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) is out. Link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com

Contents:

1. From the Editor: Pakistan's political crisis.

2. Rashed Rahman: The Left in Pakistan.

3. Vijay Prashad: In Malay, Orangutans means 'People of the Forest', but those forests are disappearing.

Rashed Rahman

Editor Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook)

Business Recorder Column December 20, 2022

Has Imran Khan shot his bolt?

 

Rashed Rahman

 

Imran Khan finally announced the date for the dissolution of the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial Assemblies on December 17, 2022, after having threatened it for weeks. The date set for the dissolution is December 23, 2022. During his virtual address to the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) rally in Liberty Chowk, Gulberg, Lahore, he had seated Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Parvez Elahi and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) CM Mahmood Khan beside him. However, when Imran Khan once again lambasted his favourite hobby horse these days, former COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa, Parvez Elahi’s expression and body language betrayed his discomfort.

Sure enough, the very next day, December 18, 2022, the Punjab CM took Imran Khan to task for continuously criticizing General Bajwa and asserted that he and his party, Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) would no longer tolerate any such remarks against the former army chief, whom he described as our and PTI’s benefactor. That did not detract Imran Khan from once again on December 18, 2022 painting the former army chief as having no problem with corruption and therefore himself being corrupt. Parvez Elahi on the other hand, having just dashed to Rawalpindi for a meeting with the establishment, once again reiterated in a TV interview his relationship with the establishment, which he described as long-lasting and never broken under any circumstances even when times were rough in his interactions with the ubiquitous establishment.

Parvez Elahi’s angry rebuttal of Imran Khan’s continuing attacks on General Bajwa really put the cat among the pigeons as far as the PML-Q-PTI alliance is concerned. Prime Minister (PM) Shahbaz Sharif and Pakistan People’s Party co-chairperson Asif Ali Zardari, perhaps sensing an opening, wooed Chaudhry Shujaat by suggesting some form of accommodation of Parvez Elahi to continue as CM Punjab if he were to ditch Imran Khan and come over to the Pakistan Democratic Movement’s (PDM’s) side. If that fails, the two PDM leaders discussed all the options available to halt the dissolution, particularly Punjab’s provincial Assembly’s, including moving a no-confidence motion against Parvez Elahi and/or asking him to take a vote of confidence from the Punjab house.

In the meantime, Imran Khan’s insistent demand that the National Assembly (NA) Speaker, Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, accept the mass resignations of the PTI MNAs, does not seem to be going anywhere. The idea was that if the Punjab and KP Assemblies are dissolved along with the NA resignations being accepted, this would mount what the PTI hopes will be irresistible pressure on the government to announce early elections. However, the snag is that the NA secretariat has expressed doubts about the signatures on some of the PTI MNAs’ resignation letters, and Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf has flatly refused to accept the resignations without first verifying from the PTI MNAs face-to-face that they stand by their resignation letters of their own free will and without any pressures or coercion.

Whichever way all these manoeuvres by both sides pan out, Imran Khan’s plan is clear. He wants to deny any further remaining legitimacy to the existing political structure in order to make early elections necessary. Will he succeed in this endeavour is at least open to question, given the very public ‘falling out’ with Parvez Elahi, the blockage of the NA mass resignations, and Imran Khan’s off-again, on-again assaults on General Bajwa and, by implication, on the institution of the military. It should perhaps be recalled that since his ouster in April 2022 through a no-confidence motion, Imran Khan has been railing about a foreign (US) conspiracy to get rid of his government. The cypher story never really took off nor was accepted by people. Now Imran Khan has joined General Bajwa’s name to the foreign conspiracy and, in his latest diatribe, accorded the honorific ‘corrupt’ on the former army chief’s name.

In the same breath, and ignoring or unaware of the implications and fallout of his anti-Bajwa attacks, Imran Khan expects the new COAS, General Asim Munir, to adhere to what General Bajwa in his farewell address had claimed: that the military had made mistakes and violated the Constitution in the past by intervening in politics, and had decided henceforth to remain neutral. However, Imran Khan will only be satisfied that the military has indeed become politically neutral if the new COAS ‘ensures’ early elections are held after the dissolution of two provincial Assemblies and the mass resignation of PTI MNAs. What kind of ‘neutrality’ would that be? Imran Khan’s weak grasp on logic in the interest of his self-serving daily propaganda blasts is exposed by this contradiction in his stance.

The fact is that with the failure of his street rallies and abortive long march (because of being wounded in the Wazirabad attack), Imran Khan seems frustrated and desperate. He is therefore flailing around, clutching at straws, and, in his inimitable style, contradicting himself almost with every breath (the famous U-turns). Such a desperate hankering for a return to power (with, he hopes, the support of a ‘neutral’ establishment) seems to have addled whatever political sense Imran Khan ever had.

Imran Khan’s political fate and future will probably be decided in the next few days if his dissolution gambit and denuding the NA of PTI MNAs does not work out. That would imply Imran Khan has shot his bolt and needs to return to the drawing board, realistically assess the lay of the land and the forces arraigned against him if he is to keep his and the PTI’s hopes for the future alive and credible.

 

 

 

 

rashed.rahman1@gmail.com

rashed-rahman.blogspot.com

Inauguration of Season of world Cinema at RPC

 Research and Publication Centre (RPC) in collaboration with Filmbar (on Instagram) announces the inauguration of a Season of World Cinema beginning Friday, December 16, 2022 with the first screening of Ingmar Bergman's Persona.

In the first of a series of legendary performances for Bergman, Liv Ullmann plays a stage actor who has inexplicably gone mute. An equally mesmerising Bibi Andersson is the garrulous young nurse caring for her in a remote island cottage. While isolated, the two women undergo a mysterious spiritual and emotional transference. Performed with astonishing nuance and shot in stark contrast and soft light by Sven Nykvist, the film is a penetrating, dreamlike work of profound psychological depth.

Timing: 5:00 pm, Friday, December 16, 2022 at Research and Publication Centre (RPC), 2nd floor, 65 Main Boulevard Gulberg, Lahore (next to Standard Chartered Bank, above Indesign showroom).

All friends are welcome. Tea will be served after the show.

Rashed Rahman

Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook) 

Business Recorder Column December 13, 2022

Wages of the original sin

 

Rashed Rahman

 

The incident of unprovoked and indiscriminate shelling by Afghan Taliban forces at the Chaman border on December 11, 2022, in which one security man was killed and 16 others injured, may be considered the wages of the original sin of meddling in the neighbouring country’s affairs. Although the incident in question evoked counter-firing by our forces, ISPR did not dilate on casualties on the Afghan side. That was left to Mr Zaid, the Kandahar Governor’s spokesman to reveal. He said one Afghan security man was killed and 13 injured, which included 10 soldiers and three civilians. Reports say the Afghan forces took umbrage when some Afghan citizens were refused entry into Pakistan because of incomplete documents. Another report has it that some people from the Afghan side tried to cut a fence near the border village of Lala Mohammad, which resulted in the closing of the Friendship Gate at Chaman. Although the border was reopened after half an hour, soon after the Afghan forces started firing at two border posts, prompting a response by Pakistani forces. The Afghan troops then escalated the exchange by using artillery and mortars.

Traditionally, despite Pakistan emerging as an independent state in 1947, the Afghan border had remained porous for as long as memory serves. Document checking, in fact any checking at all was the exception rather than the rule, given nomadic Powindas crossing the line seasonally and the tribes on either side being linked through family and other ties. All this changed, gradually but incrementally, during the Afghan wars following the Communist coup in that country in 1978, the subsequent Soviet invasion in 1979, and the rest, as they say, is history. Following the Soviet withdrawal in 1989, the resistance Mujahideen soon fell into a civil war, ending only when the Afghan Taliban took over in 1996. Ousted by the US invasion following 9/11, the Afghan Taliban retreated into and found safe havens in Pakistani territory, from where they waged a guerrilla resistance until the occupiers tired and called it quits in 2021.

The Afghan Taliban had thus, with more than a little help from Pakistan’s security establishment, come back to power triumphant. Islamabad is faulted for harbouring the wishful thinking that the Taliban regime in Kabul would take action against the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), whose forces had taken shelter with the Afghan Taliban on Afghan soil in the face of the irresistible pressure applied by Pakistani military offensives against them in the tribal areas. The TTP emerged as a result of the long Afghan wars, during which first the Afghan Mujahideen and later the Taliban lived cheek by jowl with local people in Pakistan’s tribal areas. Logistics and intelligence help from Pakistani tribesmen was exchanged for ideological indoctrination of the Pakistani Taliban, hence the TTP.

Pakistan had been resentful of Afghanistan’s refusal to accept the emergence of Pakistan as an independent successor state of the British Raj because of irredentist claims on Pakistani Pashtun territory. Such irredentist claims fly in the face of history, otherwise some people in Pakistan may have been tempted to claim suzerainty over Afghanistan, at least up to Kabul, which often remained within the acquisitions of Subcontinental empires that rose and fell in the past. Fortunately, no such claim ever saw the light of day on this side. Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan remained fraught because of such irredentism, despite the commonality of ethnicity and culture on either side of the new border. When Sardar Daoud overthrew the Afghan monarchy in 1973, this tipped the already strained Pakistan-Afghanistan relationship into a tailspin from which it never recovered. Daoud’s credentials as an ardent Pashtun nationalist had been well established in his earlier stint in power under the monarchy. His crackdown on Islamist militant organisations persuaded their leaders such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and Ahmed Shah Masoud to flee to Pakistan, where they were taken under the wing of the ISI during Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s government, trained, equipped and infiltrated back into Afghanistan as the embryonic beginnings of the Mujahideen. The rest, at the risk of repeating oneself, is history.

The Afghan Taliban in 2001 had clearly indicated that they were not Pakistani satraps when they rejected Musharraf’s plea to surrender Osama bin Laden to the US after 9/11. Having helped them come back to power after a 20-year guerrilla resistance, Pakistan could be forgiven for naivete despite the 9/11episode in thinking the Afghan Taliban would completely go along with Pakistan’s desire they act against the TTP. On the contrary, the Haqqani Network, to whom the TTP is close, persuaded Islamabad to hold negotiations with the TTP. Having learnt little from the futility of such negotiations with fanatical terrorists in the past, the Pakistani security establishment was misled and now finds the so-called ceasefire was little else but a ruse to allow the TTP time to regroup and infiltrate back into Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. In the erstwhile tribal areas as well as adjoining settled areas, this has aroused a storm of anxiety amongst the local people, who do not want a repetition of the terrorist wave of the past. In some areas, local jirgas are threatening to take up arms in self-defence against the TTP if the state does not protect them.

The wages of the original sin are now upon us. It is time the security establishment woke up to the resurgent terrorist threat and conducted necessary operations against them to, this time, scotch the snake for good.

 

 

 

 

 

rashed.rahman1@gmail.com

rashed-rahman.blogspot.com

Inauguration of RPC Season of World Cinema

Research and Publication Centre (RPC) in collaboration with Filmbar (on Instagram) announces the inauguration of a Season of World Cinema beginning Friday, December 16, 2022 with the first screening of Ingmar Bergman's Persona.

In the first of a series of legendary performances for Bergman, Liv Ullmann plays a stage actor who has inexplicably gone mute. An equally mesmerising Bibi Andersson is the garrulous young nurse caring for her in a remote island cottage. While isolated, the two women undergo a mysterious spiritual and emotional transference. Performed with astonishing nuance and shot in stark contrast and soft light by Sven Nykvist, the film is a penetrating, dreamlike work of profound psychological depth.

Timing: 5:00 pm, Friday, December 16, 2022 at Research and Publication Centre (RPC), 2nd floor, 65 Main Boulevard Gulberg, Lahore (next to Standard Chartered Bank, above Indesign showroom).

All friends are welcome. Tea will be served after the show.

Rashed Rahman

Editor, Pakistan Monthly Review (PMR) (link: pakistanmonthlyreview.com)

Director, Research and Publication Centre (RPC) (on Facebook) 

The News on Sunday Column December 11, 2022

As written by me.

Political muddle

 

Rashed Rahman

 

Since Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) government’s ouster through a no-confidence motion in April 2022, the country’s political horizon has been exhibiting extremes of noise and confusion, with no end in sight so far. This muddle is the result of Imran Khan’s aggressive campaign against the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government and the now retired COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa for ‘ditching’ Imran. The received wisdom is that Imran Khan lost the backing of the military establishment in 2021 over the appointment of a new ISI chief to replace Lt-General (now retired) Faiz Hameed, whom Imran insisted on retaining. The fact is that Lt-General (retd) Faiz Hameed had to take command of a corps in order to be eligible for appointment as COAS. He was thus appointed Peshawar Corps Commander over Imran’s objections and foot dragging on the new ISI incumbent’s decision. This episode was certainly a turning point in the Imran Khan-military establishment’s relationship, which is alleged to have been carefully crafted and nurtured from 2011 onwards.

However, it is arguable that while the ISI chief issue may have proved the last straw for the military establishment accused of manipulating the 2018 general elections to bring Imran Khan to power, a whole series of reservations about Imran Khan’s handling of the economy (e.g. 70 percent increase in borrowing in four years as compared to the previous 70 years), foreign relations (alienating the US, China, Saudi Arabia and the UAE), accountability (not a single case initiated by Imran Khan’s government through the National Accountability Bureau could be proved), and politics (virtually ignoring parliament, hitting new lows in language and conduct towards the opposition) may have fed into the military establishment’s growing alarm about the direction the country appeared to be heading in. Not the least of the military’s worries was the pressure on the defence budget because of bad economic performance.

Urban legend has it that once the establishment had decided it could no longer support Imran Khan, it may have ‘facilitated’ the jumping ship by 20 PTI MNAs during the no-confidence vote. Immediately after his ouster, Imran Khan came out with guns blazing against his erstwhile backers (and the US, claimed to be behind the ‘conspiracy’ to oust him). This unprecedented abusive diatribe against the now retired COAS General Bajwa and other top military commanders proved highly offensive to the institution, but its inability to put a stop to this abuse (allegedly because there was some support and sympathy for Imran Khan within the military) proved highly embarrassing. General Bajwa left under a cloud because of this denouement, and it is only now, when the change of command has been completed, that Imran Khan and the PTI have called a ‘ceasefire’ in a transparent attempt to mend fences with the new command.

Imran Khan’s attempts to turn the tables on the government and the establishment through street power (public rallies, the long march, now again street rallies) have not yielded the results he may have hoped for. The long march more or less fizzled out after the Wazirabad attack in which Imran Khan was wounded. Street rallies are unlikely in the prevailing atmosphere to pressurise an increasingly determined government to hold early general elections, as Imran Khan has been demanding.

Actually the main actors in the ouster of Imran Khan were not equally motivated to go ahead with the no-confidence move. Pakistan People’s Party chief Asif Zardari was determined to see the back of Imran Khan as was the Jamiat-i-Ulema-Islam-Fazl’s Maulana Fazlur Rehman. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) was, however, arguably of two minds. Nawaz Sharif was of the view that it would be better to leave Imran Khan in place till the end of his term (August 2023) as his deteriorating political graph would by then have seen him fall totally flat on his face, providing the opposition as a whole a clear road to victory in the 2023 general elections. Zardari, and Shahbaz Sharif, were committed to get rid of the corruption cases filed against them during the PTI tenure. The latter may also have been motivated by the ambition (in the absence of the elder brother) to secure the prime ministership. However, despite their success in ousting Imran Khan, the PDM coalition has found itself burdened by the messy legacy of the PTI, contributing to a loss of political capital.

Imran Khan’s threat to dissolve the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assemblies if his demand for early elections is not met is proving harder to do than perhaps Imran had thought. Despite lip service to being bound by Imran Khan’s command, Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Pervaiz Elahi’s Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) seems reluctant to let go of power in the politically most important province. The rumour mill is also alleging the CM has initiated contacts with the new army top brass, a proclivity Pervaiz Elahi has revealed the other day, stretches back to 1983 (and perhaps even earlier).

Until now, the PML-N seemed not to be taking the Assemblies dissolution threat too seriously. However, after examining the constitutional, legal and political options to prevent the dissolution happening, the PML-N seems to have come to the conclusion that this is not an easy task. They have now decided, on Nawaz Sharif’s directive, to prepare for the possibility that a dissolution may occur. Nawaz has asked the party’s Punjab chief, Rana Sanaullah, to initiate homework to identify suitable candidates for Punjab, the PML-N’s traditional stronghold, in the event a dissolution and fresh election is unavoidable.

Whatever the role, past and present, of the main characters in this drama may have been, the country seems headed for a denouement that poses new, and at present unanswerable, dilemmas.

As printed by the paper.

Political muddle

 

Rashed Rahman

 

Since the ouster of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) government through a no-confidence motion in April 2022, the country’s political horizon has been exhibiting extremes of noise and confusion, with no end in sight so far. This muddle is the result of Imran Khan’s aggressive campaign against the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government and the now retired COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa for ‘ditching’ Imran. The received wisdom is that Imran Khan lost the backing of the military establishment in 2021 over the appointment of a new ISI chief to replace Lt-General (now retired) Faiz Hameed, whom Imran insisted on retaining. The fact is that Hameed had to take command of a corps in order to be eligible for appointment as COAS. He was thus appointed the Peshawar Corps Commander over Imran’s objections and foot dragging on the appointment of the new ISI chief. This episode was certainly a turning point in the Imran Khan-military establishment’s relationship.

However, it can be argued that while the ISI chief issue may have proved the last straw for the military establishment accused of manipulating the 2018 general elections to bring Imran Khan to power, a whole series of reservations about Imran Khan’s handling of the economy (e.g. 70 percent increase in borrowing in four years as compared to the previous 70 years), foreign relations (alienating the US, China, Saudi Arabia and the UAE), accountability (not a single case initiated by Imran Khan’s government through the National Accountability Bureau could be proved), and politics (virtually ignoring parliament, hitting new lows in language and conduct towards the opposition) may have fed into the military establishment’s growing alarm about the direction the country appeared to be heading in. Not the least of the military’s worries was the pressure on the defence budget because of bad economic performance.

Urban legend has it that once the establishment had decided it could no longer support Imran Khan, it may have ‘facilitated’ the jumping ship by 20 PTI MNAs during the no-confidence vote. Immediately after his ouster, Imran Khan came out with guns blazing against his erstwhile backers (and the US, claimed to be behind the ‘conspiracy’ to oust him). This unprecedented diatribe against the (now retired) COAS and other top military commanders was highly offensive to the institution and highly embarrassing. Gen Bajwa left under a cloud because of this denouement, and it is only now, after the change of command has been completed, that Imran Khan and the PTI have called a ‘ceasefire’ in a transparent attempt to mend fences with the new command.

Imran Khan’s attempts to turn the tables on the government and the establishment through street power (public rallies, the long march, street rallies once again) have not yielded the results he may have hoped for. The long march more or less fizzled out after the Wazirabad attack in which Imran Khan was wounded. Street rallies are unlikely in the prevailing atmosphere to mount enough pressure on an increasingly determined government to hold early general elections.

Actually, the main actors in the ouster of Imran Khan were not equally motivated to go ahead with the no-confidence move. The Pakistan Peoples Party chief Asif Zardari was determined to see the back of Imran Khan as was the Jamiat-i-Ulema-Islam-Fazl’s Maulana Fazlur Rehman. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) was, however, arguably of two minds. Nawaz Sharif was of the view that it would be better to leave Imran Khan in place till the end of his term (August 2023) as his deteriorating political graph would by then have seen him fall totally flat on his place, providing the opposition as a whole a clear road to victory in the 2023 general elections. Zardari and Shahbaz Sharif were committed to get rid of the corruption cases filed against them during the PTI tenure. The latter may also have been motivated by the ambition (in the absence of the elder brother) to secure the prime ministership. However, despite their success in ousting Imran Khan, the PDM coalition has found itself burdened by the messy legacy of the PTI, contributing to a loss of political capital.

Imran Khan’s threat to dissolve the provincial assemblies in the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa if his demand for early elections is not met is proving harder to execute than perhaps Imran had believed. Despite lip service to being bound by Imran Khan’s command, Chief Minister Parvez Elahi’s Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) seems reluctant to let go of power in the politically most important province. The rumour mill is also alleging that the CM has initiated contacts with the new army top brass, a proclivity Elahi has revealed the other day and which stretches back at least to 1983.

Until recently, the PML-N seemed not to be taking the assemblies’ dissolution threat too seriously. However, after examining the constitutional, legal and political options to prevent the dissolution happening, the PML-N seems to have come to the conclusion that this is not an easy task. They have now decided, on Nawaz Sharif’s directive, to prepare for the possibility that a dissolution may occur. Nawaz has asked the party’s Punjab chief, Rana Sanaullah, to initiate homework to identify suitable candidates for the Punjab, the PML-N’s traditional stronghold, in the event a dissolution and fresh election are unavoidable.

Whatever the role, past and present, of the main characters in this drama may have been, the country seems headed for a denouement that poses new, and at present unanswerable, dilemmas.

 

The writer is a veteran journalist who has held senior editorial positions in several newspapers

Business Recorder Column December 6, 2022

Bajwa tales

 

Rashed Rahman

 

The fierce ping pong of statements by the government and the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) continues without any signs of abating in favour of a civilised, democratic exchange. Of late, these diatribes have centred on the role of former COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa. No sooner had General Bajwa laid down his uniform on November 29, 2022 that Imran Khan launched into a series of interviews and messages bemoaning his having trusted General Bajwa, whom he accused of playing a ‘double game’ (i.e. playing both sides against the middle). Predictably, Prime Minister (PM) Shahbaz Sharif and Federal Railways Minister Khwaja Saad Rafique whaled into Imran Khan in response, the PM accusing him of undermining the foundations of the country just to regain power, while Saad Rafique took up Imran’s statement admitting his giving General Bajwa an extension his biggest mistake. If so, asked Saad Rafique, why did Imran Khan repeat the offer later, when things had gone down the tube?

While these responses from the government fall within the ambit of the predictable, Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Pervaiz Elahi followed up on his son Moonis Elahi’s revelation the other day that General Bajwa nudged them towards the PTI in April 2022 during the build-up to the no-confidence motion against Imran Khan’s government. The father not only upheld the son’s statement, he virtually thanked God (and General Bajwa) for showing them the light and the better way forward: towards the PTI. Pervaiz Elahi went on to boast that he has smooth, cordial relations with the army (and judiciary) since 1983. He then dilated on the Sharifs’ untrustworthiness, claiming they had ditched him at least five times, without however explaining when and how. Sceptics may be inclined to view the statement about ‘smooth, cordial relations’ with the army as an admission of being part of the collaborationist political culture that has overtaken the country since the last three to four decades. And they would be justified in asking the CM about his and his family’s ditching the Sharifs after the 1999 military coup.

What Moonis and his father’s remarks point to is the distance between their perceptions and Imran Khan’s continuing bluster against his erstwhile supporter General Bajwa and, by extension, the institution of the military. Elder Chaudhry Shujaat refused to go along with Pervaiz Elahi’s joining PTI because of Imran Khan’s insulting behaviour towards the army and its top commanders. But Pervaiz says, despite and in refutation of Imran Khan’s claims, that General Bajwa did not play any double game. To soften the blow perhaps, Pervaiz Elahi in the next breath said neither did Imran Khan. CM Pervaiz Elahi expressed his preference for the Punjab Assembly to remain intact till at least March 2023, while hastening to add the ritual rider that he would not hesitate even a minute should Imran Khan command the dissolution. Pervaiz chided his political ‘boss’ for name calling the military top brass Mir Sadiq and Mir Jaffer. He also delivered the wisdom that Imran Khan’s team was ‘amateur’ and therefore could not deliver.

The father-son duo’s defence of General Bajwa and differing narrative from Imran Khan suggests distance, if not a gulf, between the two allies. Given CM Pervaiz Elahi’s boast about his relationship with the army since 1983, these differences revolve around keeping the military on board by not lambasting the previous top brass, a gambit seen as annoying to the institution as a whole. Admittedly, the unprecedented exposure of the military’s role in bringing Imran Khan to power through questionable if not dubious means, the saga of growing differences between the backers and the PTI government, and the eventual denouement points in the sorry direction of one more example of the military’s intervention in politics and, as it turns out, a disastrous one at that.

General Bajwa will no doubt have the time and leisure now to reflect on what has befallen him as a result of all these controversies. Some would see his departure as an unenviable end to his six years in power. General Bajwa must be rueing the fallout for his personal prestige and repute as well as for the institution he commanded. Perhaps the afterthought may strike him that he would have been better off and left behind a more honourable legacy had he not accepted the extension and gone home at the appointed time. He is of course not the only COAS who has enjoyed an extension, but each time the decision has proved controversial. For one, it disrupts the normal transition and promotion structure of the top command, engendering unnecessary bitterness amongst those who end up missing their best chances. Two, it militates in favour of the military’s intervention in politics, something General Bajwa says the institution has now decided to stay away from. If so, we should consider ways and means to stop this practice permanently in the interests of the country as well as the military.

The unremitting and shrill political confrontation between the two sides of the political divide shows no signs of abating or leading to a reasonable, democratic solution. However, since being ousted through a no-confidence motion in April 2022, Imran Khan has tried all the tricks up his sleeve to pave the path to his return to power. These include street power (rallies, long march) and the threat to disrupt the system by dissolving the Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assemblies and precipitating provincial elections in over half the country (by population). However, this last threat now increasingly reveals itself as merely a pressure tactic to achieve the demand for early general elections. The government appears in no mood to buckle under to this demand. Therefore the likely scenario for the remainder of this year and the next seems to be more of the same: confrontation, statement ping pong and an unresolvable impasse. How long this pressure cooker can hold is beyond our powers to predict at this time.

 

 

 

 

 

rashed.rahman1@gmail.com

rashed-rahman.blogspot.com