Will March 2022 be Imran Khan’s last month as Prime Minister of Pakistan?

Will March 2022 be Imran Khan’s last month as Prime Minister of Pakistan?

Imran Khan is facing the biggest political crisis of his career. It is widely speculated in the power corridors of Pakistan that the relationship between Imran Khan and COAS General Bajwa has soured and reached a point of no return.

As a result, the Pakistan Army wants to end Imran Khan’s innings as Prime Minister. The question now is not if but when will he go.

Most probably, the next few days are his last overs when he gets to bat as Prime Minister before returning to pavilion. Sensing the change in mood of the army, many of Imran Khan’s loyalists have switched sides and moved to the opposition benches forcing the government to face a no-confidence motion in the parliament.

The civilian governments in Pakistan have never been stable unless they enjoyed the full support of the army. The army played a significant role in getting Imran Khan elected to the office at the first place.

It seems quite improbable that Imran Khan could continue after this cleavage in his relationship with the army. Moreover, he has been a complete failure on the economic front and could not deliver what he had promised to the people.

Inflation is at a historical high, and coupled with high unemployment, it has brought severe economic deprivation on the citizenry. People are reeling under poverty. All of this has turned the tide of public opinion against Imran Khan.

The opposition senses a chance for itself to stage a comeback and is putting up a united front against the government.

Pakistan’s political waters have never really been calm, but the last few weeks and days have been particularly choppy even by those standards. The opposition leaders have come together in a united front to present a no-confidence motion against Imran Khan’s PTI.

That motion was taken up in the Pakistan National Assembly on March 28, 2022. To win the vote, the PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) needs a simple majority. The Pakistan National Assembly has a total of 342 seats, and the majority mark is 172. At present, the PTI has 155 seats of its own, and the rest come from its allies represented by a group of six different parties.

PM Imran Khan proposed his own confidence motion in March 2021 and won that motion by garnering 178 votes for himself. There have been two previous no-confidence motion introduced in the Pakistan National Assembly, one in 1989 against Benazir Bhutto and another in 2006 against Shaukat Aziz who were the incumbent Prime Ministers then. Both survived the motion.

The present NCM is brought forth by an united opposition under the aegis of an umbrella organization called the Pakistan Democratic Movement. It was set up in 2020 and comprises most notably of PML(N) led by the Sharif brothers, Nawaz and Shahbaz.

Conservative parties like Jamaat Ul Islaam of Fazal-ur-Rehman and other jamaati parties are also part of PDM. There are some secular and regional parties also in the group like the Baloch National Party.

There are other political parties which are not part of the PDM but oppose the PTI government like the PPP led by Bilawal Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari. The ANP led by descendants of Badshah Khan and is primarily a Pakhtun party.

Both the PPP and the ANP were previously part of the PDM but they quit later. There are reports that Imran has been able to bring PML(Q) to his fold by offering them the Chief Ministership of Punjab, the largest province of Pakistan, but there are divisions within the PML(Q) itself regarding their support to PTI.

There are many factors responsible for the present political stalemate. The all-powerful army has backed out and decided to stay neutral in this tug of war between the political parties. The opposition has closed ranks like never before.

To make matters worse, about two dozen MNAs of PTI are revolting against Imran. Imran Khan held a show in Islamabad on Sunday where he invoked the notorious “foreign hand” theory ascribing the present political impasse to a conspiracy to topple him. In a marathon speech that lasted 90 minutes, Imran Khan asserted that he has a letter as evidence to support his claims.

The question in everyone’s mind is  why did the darling of the Pakistan army turn into a pariah for them.

When Imran Khan got elected in 2018, it was widely believed that the powerful Pakistan army played a crucial role, and it was possible only because of a tacit understanding with them.

It is no secret that the army and the ISI call the shots in Pakistan, and democracy largely has been a sham for many decades. No Prime Minister of Pakistan has been able to complete the full five-year term in office.

When Imran Khan was campaigning for election, he advertised his excellent ties with the army as one of his USP, and during his campaign would emphasize that he could focus on governance without any distraction. Imran Khan allowed the army to take the lead in almost all key domestic issues as well as foreign policy relegating himself to the position of a second fiddle.

The problem started because of very inept handling of the economy by the Imran Khan government. Imran Khan’s popularity declined in proportion to soaring inflation and unemployment.

Imran’s main plank during his election campaign was his promise to weed out corruption from the system and provide jobs to the youth. With inflation at a record high of 12%, the purchasing power of the Pakistani Rupee plummeted sharply thereby putting the ordinary man under tremendous economic hardship, with people wondering if this was the new Pakistan that was promised to them by Imran Khan.

The pandemic exacerbated the effect of a dwindling economy by further restricting economic activity because of lockdowns. Notwithstanding Corona, the mismanagement of the economy by the PTI government is at the root of the economic catastrophe that the country is facing now.

Another highlight of his electoral rhetoric was his public announcement that he would not resort to external borrowing from foreign agencies, especially IMF, to end Pakistan’s cycle of debt.

This was his major grouse against the previous governments of Pakistan whom he accused of going around with a “begging bowl.” He had to eat humble pie on this as he himself was forced to seek a $6 billion IMF bailout to shore up his forex reserves and keep the economy floating.

Imran’s biggest mistake was to challenge the authority of the Pakistan army General Bajwa in appointing the DG of ISI. This proved to be the last nail in his coffin.

General Bajwa wanted ISI chief Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed to be moved out and replaced by Lieutenant General Nadeem Anjum.

Imran resisted this tooth and nail as Lieutenant General Faiz had played a key role in getting him elected. He refused to sign off on the appointment of the new ISI chief for three weeks but was ultimately forced to do so.

The trust between him and the military had broken down. This raised a red flag in the army as the institutional ethos of the army does not permit its generals to build their own relationships with the politicians.

Within the army, there was a concern that Imran would help General Hameed become army chief while General Hameed would ensure his re-election in 2023.

Noticing this fracture developing between the army and Imran, the opposition fancied its chances of coming back to power and got its act together to oust the PTI government through a no-confidence motion. The NCM was introduced in the National Assembly on March 28 by Shahbaz Sharif of the PMLN.

Ironically, no civilian government in Pakistan has been removed through a confidence vote. This does not augur well for the future of Pakistan as this is likely to spiral further it into chaos, instability and uncertainty.

India has been watching these developments closely notwithstanding the fact that ties with Imran have been cold.  The army calls the

shots on India anyway and will always continue to do so. Indian establishment is keeping its fingers crossed and watching the show.

edited and published by nikita sharma