By: Qanoot Fatima
After the birth of Pakistan, there have never been any consecutive years when there’s seen complete stability inside the country. Democracy or dictatorship, the driving forces have never been able to put it on the paved path. Resultantly Pakistan has always faced serious consequences whether in the form of martial laws or criminal governments. Regime change operations and succumbing to public opinion by controlling media also risk the stability factor in a country. Vis-à-vis, putting the economy on the back burner has made Pakistan reach the edge of bankruptcy. The current government is busy granting itself relives as most of them are out on bail and that makes the situation more deplorable. Pakistan is considered one of the most important countries in the Asia Pacific region. The last August made it completed its 75 years of independence. Since it was set free, it has faced many thrones. In the first 09 years of its birth, there has been the rule of civilian governments which were made with the help of the establishment as no government can set itself in the governing position without the help of it. Pakistan from the beginning has faced the form of unstable governments. Yet, No government, either democratic or autocratic has ever completed its tenure because there has always been political turmoil and chaos going on in the country. The first civilian government set up was taken over by martial law imposed by Sikandar Mirza who himself was deposed by General Ayub Khan. And the civilian setup was overthrown with the accusation of dishonest and corrupt practices, which were justified later. Since that time Pak Army is involved in running the country, both in direct and indirect ways. The country of Pakistan imposed four martial laws. The first one was executed by Sikandar Mirza in 1958, the second was executed by general Yahya Khan in 1969, the third was implied by Zia ul Haq in 1977 and the fourth martial law was implied by general Pervaiz Musharraf.
The unstable nature of governments in Pakistan is also due to the stamped political families which will rule. Pakistan has seen two major governments, the parties of PML-N and PPP led by the Sharif and Bhutto/Zardari families. The generation-to-generation transmission of the throne in these families is a root cause of the political disturbance in Pakistan. This ruling elite has worked as mafias in Pakistan. Nawaz and Shehbaz Sharif are considered the masters of this string. This mafia has burgled all of the assets of Pakistan and not only that the Shareef mafia and their defenders are bluntly defending the corruption charges. On the other hand, the Zardari mafia is no less than the Sharif mafia in the path of corruption. Zardari’s rule has also benefited its family in the name of ruling Pakistan. Mafia rule was never going to end but there then emerged a new political party named PTI. It gained a lot of popularity after the elections of 2013 but didn’t make it. And finally, in the elections of 2018, this party got the biggest chunk of votes following a parliamentary setup and setting Imran Khan as the Prime minister. But as historically seen no Pakistani prime minister has ever completed its five-year tenure, this time too prime minister Imran Khan was removed with a motion of no confidence through a regime change operation. Other than the accusations, this was the first time when a constitutional way was adopted for regime change operation.
Regime change and political crisis
Though there were a lot of causes but the Imran-Bajwa divide is considered an important cause for the removal of PTI’s government. There were the matters of some major appointments, which caused this divide. But this divide ultimately took Khan to a tight spot and resultantly he lost his government. When the regime change operation took place in Pakistan, some major powers such as China and Russia raised their voices in the favour of Imran Khan and asked small countries not to become part of the great game. The regime change operation shook Pakistani politics and since then the stability is founding no path of coming back to Pakistan. the political crisis has taken Pakistan to the edge of bankruptcy. But this needs to be understood what is a Regime Change and how it is processed.
Regime change is overthrowing a government by an external force and its replacement with a new government according to the ideas or interests promoted by that force.” Cambridge dictionary defines regime change as “a complete change of government, especially one brought about by force.” The question could arise here which external force is that much powerful that it can arrange a regime change and literally can change a government of its desire? These regime change operations are processed properly. The dominant powers do it by keeping their benefits at the forefront. They set up puppet governments and use them to exploit their weaknesses. This is processed then and there whenever the power feels any danger to its benefits. As for Pakistan, a cipher was sent to the Pakistani diplomat asking for the removal of prime minister Imran Khan and that too before the no-confidence motion, threatening for facing bad consequences if Imran khan does not get removed.
After the removal of Imran khan, the nation stepped outside on the roads and showed its fullest aggression because in the regime change operation the elected prime minister was removed, and following that the biggest of the mafia in the name of PDM supported Shehbaz Sharif to take the oath as Prime minister. The PTI alleges that the no-confidence motion took place under a foreign conspiracy with the involvement of domestic forces and some powerful media houses also helped in that. This was not acceptable at all to the public of Pakistan so they started talking against the regime change operation in out loud way. The difference between civilians and military leadership is just because of the regime change operation. The general public and media are asking the same question repeatedly why these looters have been imposed on them again replacing the elected prime minister? The hustle then created is yet not sorted. Things could have settled if this was the only thing to talk about but this government started using highly negative tactics to shut down the voices which were rising against them and started a powerful crackdown on the accountability bureaus and the media channels which were airing the narrative of common people.
Controlled-media supremacy
No ambiguity lies there that Imran Khan is the most popular leader of the time and the by-elections have proved it, in which he stood there all alone competing with the 13-party PDM and won against them. This popularity and the questioning of the general public and media journalists were undigestable for the current government. New governments come up with new betterment policies for the nation, this government also had some of the best policy initiatives but ill fate, for their own they were. Corruption charges, being part of mafias, and looting the country to make it paralyze made these previous governments hit very low in their political career which flew their throne away. And then coming again to the rule was a big question that how they got this relief. As soon as they got the rule the national assembly approved amendments to NAB laws. Which were as; no arrests could be made before the completion of the investigation process. Secondly, federal and provincial tax matters were removed from NAB’s purview as well as financial irregularities in any development project. Thirdly they reduced the remand duration from 90 days to 14 days. Following that NAB has to complete inquiries within 6 weeks, and prolonged cases will be dismissed. All these amendments were made following the cases which are on almost all of the persons sitting in this government. Not counting it enough PDM national assembly snatched the overseas voting right and made the use of electronic voting machines diffused. And they also took their names out of the ECL.
Then this government turned its head towards the media, as said before in the regime change operation there were some facilitator media houses too. But the channels and the journalists who wanted to ask questions faced serious consequences. Media channels that didn’t ask a question about the regime change and supported it were free but on the other hand, the channels airing the unbiased narrative faced restrictions. Their channels are being swept away from the mainstream. Limited coverage and simply no coverage is given to the narrative which is opposing their say. The primetime and elite journalists of this time have faced serious life threats. The journalists have been said to shut their voices up and not ask questions of any type. This government made the life of daring and truthful journalists hell over here. Starting from threatening, then arresting them in fake cases, and then prolonging the proceedings for the sake of physical remand just to seize their lips is just fun to this government. The key journalists of Pakistan face serious threats to life and are unable to make their living here in Pakistan. A most prominent, senior anchor person and journalist Arshad Sharif lost his life in Kenya where he was brutally murdered. He was fully aware of the threats but his thoughts and work were just focused on the human of Pakistan. Many believe that the documentary ” Behind Closed Doors” on which he was working, is a major cause of his death because he denied to shut down the corruption investigations against the looters. In this documentary, many hidden deals and corruption scandals of the Sharif mafia are going to be unveiled. The daring investigative journalist also questioned some of the higher authorities for the sake of his country but he was paid back in such a way that while in a briefing over his murder case with Kenya authorities, Pakistan’s official was found playing a game on his mobile phone which gave almost all the answers of questions which he has been questioning throughout. In Pakistan, right now journalists are fleeing to save lives but are not surrendering. whenever a journalist or investigator dares to open a query on this government or PDM, they hit a low against them and they have to face the circumstances like baseless FIRs, custodial tortures, and dignity loss luckily if a person has endured all these mental tortures and still working on the things, then the last resort of this mafia is to make the person taste death. Since the Sharif mafia came into power, here are some people who faced death who were directly linked with the cases against them.
Gulzar Ahmed; the witness of the Ramzan Sugar Case. He was slowly poisoned till death.
Muzammil Raja; was the witness and responsible to draw money from fake accounts of Ramzan Sugar. He had a sudden heart attack with no history of a heart-related issue.
Ghulam Shabbir; “Benaimdar” account holder for all laundered money. He also had a sudden Heart attack with no history of heart problems.
Maqsood Chaprasi; Main witness and “benaimdar” account holder of Sharif Mafia. Found dead in his apartment due to an unknown reason.
Dr. Rizwan; The main investigator of the money laundering case against the Sharif Mafia. He died due to a heart attack after constant pressure from Shabaz and Hamza Sharif.
Imran Raza; Investigator of cases against Rana Sana Ullah and co. He committed suicide due to constant pressure from the interior ministry.
Arshad Sharif; He was constantly speaking against Regime Change operations and was part of a documentary on the Sharif Mafia’s money laundering. Shot down in Nairobi, Kenya.
Civil-Military relationship
The after-effects of regime change operations have been very unpleasant till yet. As stated in various places this operation has turned Pakistan into a banana republic, where nothing goes around with proper rule and regulation. Here comes a question about the military-civilian relationship. Pakistan’s military and intelligence services are considered the most powerful army in the whole world. The public of Pakistan has a true devotion to its military. The general public and the army share a strong bond. But here the differences lie on the base of some officials who were the part of regime change operation. Other than that civil society and the general public stand with its army. Martial laws have been imposed on the Pakistani public, ending the criminal governments, and people were seen celebrating the time that corrupt rulers got off. But this time situation deems a bit different. There are black sheep in every institution and the current scenario depicts that the public is going to unveil every face behind detriments done to the country. Again, the devotion that this public has for its army is immense and matchless.
The state of Pakistan is going through a hard period where it is facing direct security threats from its borders and on the other hand, its current political turmoil and mismanagement have destabilized the country. Right now free and fair elections are the only demand of the public and this is the only thing that can settle the current chaos inside the country.
The writer is a freelance columnist. She can be reached at [email protected]