Last year I attended a wedding function in Lahore. There I met a very senior military official who had recently retired from a sensitive posting. Not at all surprisingly, he was full of praise for the civil-military hybrid political system that Pakistan has been experiencing. But with one caveat: the civil part of the hybrid system should be genuinely representative in character and its legitimacy should not be in any doubt, “you see an essential part of this hybrid system is the military top brass but the civilian side should be fully representative and its political and electoral legitimacy should be beyond any doubt” he said to me with a cryptic smile on his face. His smile revealed what remained unsaid in his long monologue on Pakistan’s political situation.
The hybrid political system took shape in the post-Musharraf period. Each time the civilian side of the system survived amidst the allegations of electoral rigging in the general elections that brought them to power. The incumbent PMLN government is standing on a very weak footing as far as its electoral and political legitimacy are concerned. PMLN emerged as the second largest party in the 2024 parliamentary elections. PTI was deprived of its election symbol and therefore could not contest the elections as a political party. Nevertheless, PTI supported candidates emerged as the single largest block. By hook or by crook, PMLN pieced together a coalition which formed the majority government in Islamabad after February 2024 elections. The electoral legitimacy of the PMLN government has been a strongly contested issue in national politics ever since.
My military interlocutor at a wedding party in Lahore was not making a political statement for public consumption. But a careful analysis of his assertion makes clear that the military leaders don’t like the idea of sharing power with an unpopular government which is losing even a decent level of public support among its traditional stronghold like Central Punjab. The situation took a very dramatic turn with the rise of military leadership to the center stage of regional and international politics. First came the four-day war with India in the middle of last year. Then Field Marshal Asim Munir was ushered in the world of international diplomacy because of regional military developments and because he happened to find himself on the right side of US President Donald Trump. For the first time in decades, we were able to read terms like Pakistani military, Pakistan’s foreign policy and diplomatic success, in the same sentence in the reports on Pakistan in national and international media. Asim Munir has been at the center of these developments.
I was not at all surprised when I heard Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi speak about the collapse of the political system. He said the system of governance had "collapsed" and would not solve Pakistan's problems. He is not simply questioning the legitimacy of the incumbent government. And maybe something unknown to himself, he is questioning the legitimacy of the system. Ironically, if we take a careful look at Pakistan's internal security and political situation, we can easily reach the conclusion that in most parts of the country there are forces which are questioning the legitimacy of the state and legitimacy of the violence that the state inflicts on segments of the society. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, it is the TTP which is questioning the legitimacy of the state and the force it is using against the militants. In Balochistan, it is the Baloch nationalists who are questioning the legitimacy of the state. More ironically PTI, one of the mainstream political parties with strongholds in central Punjab—country’s heartland—has adopted a narrative that questions the legitimacy of state processes. Mr. Naqvi, however, has sidestepped all these real political and security challenges and is aiming for a constitutional change that would divide the existing provincial administrative units into smaller units. We have been hearing voices to this effect since the passage of 27th amendment.
If a particular government fails another government can replace it. But if the political system itself is declared a failure, then the door is wide open to the argument that something outside routine and usual electoral politics must fix it.
Mr. Naqvi didn’t say that the Shehbaz Sharif government has failed or its structures have collapsed. He is talking about systemic failure. That the political and governance system itself is incapable of producing effective government. If a particular government fails another government can replace it. But if the political system itself is declared a failure, then the door is wide open to the argument that something outside routine and usual electoral politics must fix it.
Mr. Naqvi holds an abnormal position in Shehbaz Sharif’s cabinet. He is not part of the ruling party. Rather he is not part of any political party. Some reports say he is a close relative of Field Marshal Asim Munir and others say he is treated as one of his family members. It is generally believed in Islamabad’s political circles that Naqvi acts as a mouthpiece or a troubleshooter for the military leaders. The debate that has followed his speech is generally assumed that what Naqvi said was coming from the military top brass or had the endorsement of Field Marshal.
In the post Musharraf period, the nature of military control on the power structure has changed dramatically. Under General Musharraf, the military ruled directly. Now the military doesn’t rule directly but retains a tremendous influence on security, foreign policy and domestic architecture. Nawaz Sharif in his third tenure as prime minister tried to expand civilian control, which was followed by his confrontation with the judiciary and finally his ouster from power. Imran Khan also fell victim to palace intrigues and now his partymen say the then COAS, General Qamar Javed Bajwa was instrumental in his ouster from power. Resultantly, Shehbaz Sharif has been pliant from day one.
The Damocles’ sword of lack of political legitimacy should continue to hang on the heads of even the weakest of the governments in Islamabad. This is inbuilt in this hybrid political system. In fact, we have seen in the post-Musharraf period that the guidance from the military can stabilize a civilian government. If the civilian government remains within its limits. So, the mechanics of this hybrid system make it clear that the military doesn’t want the government to collapse. It wants the government to realize that it can be made to collapse. When the National Assembly passed no confidence against Imram Khan the complaint of PTI was not that the military leaders had orchestrated this no confidence motion. The complaint was that they had not extended support to Imran Khan in this dire situation. Our political system or the fate of the civilian government in it is so fragile that the government can collapse the moment military leaders withdraw support from it or perceived to have withdrawn support from the government.
Two concluding remarks: First, historically speaking Pakistani military leaders have always used their international connections to consolidate their grip on power structures of the society and state. This is as true about Ayub Khan, Zia and Musharraf, it is like to prove true in case of present military leaders. Pakistani state machinery has always proved incapable of handling success, especially international diplomatic success. It is difficult to prove that there has been any connection between the increase in Pakistan’s diplomatic status at the international stage and the way Pakistan military and political leaders are handling the Azad Kashmir situation. One thing, however, is apparent, the brutal use of force in Kashmir is coming right after diplomatic success in mediating between US and Iran. And then Mr. Naqvi delivered his own bombshell.
Secondly, my own opinion is that Mr. Naqvi’s assertions don’t go beyond the immediate aim of facilitating constitutional amendment for creating more provinces by dividing the existing ones. This plan is the brainchild of military brass. If diplomatic success is feared to fizzle out amidst growing economic hardship at the grassroot level, such uncanny ideas take birth in politically naïve minds of military top brass. My advice: There is no short cut to the need of incessant and persistent structural reforms at the social, political and state level. Disabuse yourself with the idea that you can turn around the economic situation within your tenure. Accept that your tenure has a natural end point, and let structural reform outlive your tenure.