Unending cycle of Instability

Pakistan, yet again, is in a state of crisis. Prime Minister Imran Khan, has lost whatever support he had enjoyed in parliament. The military, his principal backer, has also given up on his government and are now considering betting on other horses. Khan had sought to annul the no-confidence vote through a dissolution of the National Assembly. However, Pakistan’s Supreme Court, ruled against both these moves and called for the restoration of the no-confidence vote. Well before he lost the no-confidence vote Imran Khan’s future in office was already at risk. At the end of March, one of his key parliamentary allies, the Muttahida Quami Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P), withdrew its support for his government. There was already growing unease of the overweening Pakistani military establishment about his ability to govern the country. Khan, who displayed much dexterity on the cricket pitch, has now reached the end of his political innings.

Despite Pakistan’s shaky return to democracy since the ouster of President Pervez Musharraf following the lawyers’ movement in August 2008, the military remains primus inter pares. Since Khan, who had come to power with the military’s connivance and imprimatur, had fallen out of favour with the security apparatus, they were not inclined to mobilize their considerable resources to save his collapsing government.

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Unable to take on the overweening security machinery, Khan resorted to a tried-and-true contrivance: claiming that the United States had conspired to oust him from office. This canard gathered some currency because the Pakistani ambassador to the United States, Asad Majeed Khan, had revealed that in a private conversation, Donald Lu, the United States Assistant Secretary of State for Central and South Asia, had stated that the US-Pakistan relations might improve if Khan might lose the no-confidence motion. Such a sentiment on the part of the American diplomat was hardly surprising. Khan has been one of the most vociferous critics of the US role in Afghanistan as well as being overt supporter of the Taliban regime.

In Pakistan, however, given the vicissitudes of the fraught US-Pakistan relationship, any such careless remark feeds into the warp and woof of Pakistan’s political culture. Deeply embedded in it is a widespread willingness to take refuge in a range of conspiracy theories. Beyond Lu’s possibly infelicitous remark, no evidence, whatsoever, has emerged of an American plot to bring about Khan’s ouster. However, given the propensity of much of Pakistan’s political class to readily believe in the capacity of the US to engage in political machinations, it is hardly surprising that Khan has sought to invoke the idea of a concerted effort on the part of the US to try and remove him from office.

These flimsy and witless claims aside, what really ails Pakistan is the structural imbalance that dogs its polity. Since its creation civilian political authority has always been quite tenuous. Even before the first military coup in 1958, politicians in Pakistan had struggled to produce a viable constitutional order. It is worth recalling that Pakistan could adopt its first constitution only in 1956 – a full nine years since the independence of the country. Even then, the principal political party in the then East Pakistan, the Awami League as well as all the Hindu minority parties, had rejected it. As is well known, within two years thereafter it was abrogated as the military then seized power.

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This seizure of power on the part of the military early in the course of the nation’s history has created what institutional economists refer to as path dependence. Once certain institutions are created it is exceedingly difficult to significantly alter or modify them. From 1958 to 1969, the military was entrenched in office. For a few fleeting years, following the debacle in East Pakistan in 1971, the military was briefly discredited. Sadly, for the Pakistani state, the civilian leader, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, fecklessly squandered the opportunity to consolidate democracy. Instead thanks to his populist policies, his political chicanery and his ham-handed handling of an insurgency in Baluchistan, he too fell afoul of the military leading to his execution after being sentenced to death by a pliable judiciary.

Democracy was restored after the mysterious air crash that killed General Zia-ul-Haq in the summer of 1988. However, by this time, the military, for all practical purposes, had assumed the role of kingmakers. Their privileges had become deeply embedded in the Pakistani polity. Consequently, while civilian governments can periodically assume power, they survive at the sufferance of the military. When their actions or choices become unpalatable to the military, they can be dismissed at will on some flimsy pretext.

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The next few weeks will probably see the emergence of an interim government that enjoys the blessings of the military until elections are called. To maintain the facade of civilian rule, elections will be held in due course – but under the watchful eyes of the GHQ Rawalpindi. Whichever party or parties assume office will be cognizant of the limits of their political authority. If they dare cross what Pakistani analysts refer to as an “invisible line”, their term in office will be in jeopardy. This, of course, is the bane of Pakistan’s politics.

As argued here, its roots run deep and are unlikely to be removed anytime in the foreseeable future. Not surprisingly, this structural feature of the country’s politics consigns it to an unending cycle of political uncertainty and instability. Imran Khan’s ignominious departure is merely one more stop on this merry-go-round whose controls firmly ensconced in the hands of the imperious security order.

(The writer is a Distinguished Professor of Political Science and holds the Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations at Indiana University, US)

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