The season of swan songs

Outgoing COAS General Qamar Javed Bajwa in an address to the Defence and Martyrs Ceremony at GHQ on November 23, 2022 made an unprecedented admission about the army’s unconstitutional interference in politics for 70 years, while criticising the political parties for their errors, which include being intolerant towards rivals.

Most of the latter criticism was aimed at the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) for crafting a “fake and false” narrative against the army and calling senior commanders names. In a rare show of magnanimity, General Bajwa said they were ready to forgive these trespasses and leave the controversy behind.

General Bajwa underlined the fact that the army often faced criticism because of “unconstitutional” “interference in politics” in various ways over the last seven decades. What General Bajwa admitted regarding the (dominant)role of the army in interfering in politics has remained a widespread phenomenon. Such interference includes dislodging civilian governments through coups and indirectly controlling weak dispensations.

Political leaders are not blameless either. They readily ceded space to the military due to their weaknesses (and collaborationist tendencies to attain power), thereby allowing a breach of institutional boundaries (i.e. kowtowing to the real seat of power). General Bajwa even revealed the (recent) date of the military’s decision after intense deliberations no longer to interfere in politics. He put this at February 2022.

It may be recalled that this was a period of intense open and behind the scenes political manoeuvring in the backdrop of then Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan’s falling out with his erstwhile military backers (who brought him to power in 2018 as the third alternative to the two mainstream parties that had dominated politics since the 1990s) over the appointment of the new ISI chief and the buildup to the vote of no-confidence that removed Imran Khan and the PTI government from power.

While General Bajwa went on to say that the military was strictly adhering to its decision and would continue to do so, knowledgeable commentators by and large preferred to reserve judgement, saying only time will tell or the jury is still out on this development.

Needless to say, even this declared stance of political ‘neutrality’ was enough to incense the deposed ex-PM Imran Khan into unleashing a torrent of abuse on the military leadership, steeped no doubt in his disappointment that the ‘lift’ into power hitherto available to him had now come to a grinding halt. Hence also the cries of ‘betrayal’ by Imran Khan and the PTI.

Dilating on the so-called foreign conspiracy to bring about regime change, he questioned if this were the case, would the military stand by and do nothing? The question seems logical, but with due respect, the military could theoretically go along with any such conspiracy if it accords with its own plans. That is not to say that was the case in this instance. General Bajwa referred to the wind being taken out of the sails of this leaky foreign conspiracy boat by none other than the authors themselves by now.

No doubt obliquely referring to the unprecedented abuse the military top brass has been subjected to by Imran Khan and the PTI, General Bajwa said the army exercised restraint in the larger national interest despite having the resources and opportunities to respond to this barrage, but there is a limit. Even if we take General Bajwa at his word, he did not care to explicate whether the ‘limit’ had already been reached or what may constitute the unacceptable.

General Bajwa’s readiness to forgive errant parties such as the PTI may also, if reports and commentary in the media are to be believed, be motivated by the alleged risk of internal dissent within the military if Imran Khan is harshly dealt with. It appears the latter has been relying on supposed support within the military as a guarantee that his brinkmanship will not evoke an adverse reaction. But as on so many other issues, this may be the self-serving delusion of Imran Khan.

If there is one thing the Pakistan military is known for, it is its internal cohesiveness, unity and discipline, especially when the institution itself, in the shape of its top commanders, comes under such verbal assault.

While there would be few dissenters with General Bajwa’s formulations in general, the fact is that the military has dictated matters in the country almost since Independence. If for this purpose in the early 1950s it relied on its unholy alliance with the bureaucracy, by 1958 it had assumed direct command of the affairs of state (to be repeatedly resorted to in subsequent years).

The 1956 Constitution had already promulgated One Unit and since Independence, the military-bureaucratic oligarchy had conspired against a representative, genuine democracy that took due account of the undeniable reality that Pakistan was a multi-national state requiring a different state structure than a domineering Centre.

Add to this the peculiarity of the new state having two wings separated by a thousand miles of hostile Indian territory. Instead of taking due account of these realities, the state attempted, again and again, to impose a unitary structure that militated against the rights of the smaller nationalities and even the majority Bengali majority!

General Bajwa’s attempt to whitewash the military’s role in the 1971 debacle by calling it a political, not military failure, fails to convince. General Yahya Khan was in power at the time, and despite Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s role arguably in ensuring the debacle, the military cannot, force imbalance with the enemy notwithstanding, justify its genocidal massacre and women’s rape on a mass scale. If anything, it is a reason for all of us to hang our heads in shame.

Whether 1971, before or after, the military’s penchant for running the country directly or from behind the scenes has yielded nothing but disaster. If the appropriate lessons have been learnt without shrinking from the truth, and General Bajwa’s successors in the military’s command adhere to his statement of policy of no more interference in politics, that may offer a glimmer of hope that Pakistan may finally be headed for civilian, democratic supremacy.

But sceptics will not so easily be convinced, given our history and the military’s track record in this respect. They will no doubt be watching closely and relying only on the judgement of time.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022