Eight months in office may not be long enough to make conclusive judgment on a government’s performance but it is also not too short to comment on the direction the government has taken. Changing the cabinet batting order last week is a pointer towards that direction.
The prime minister claims that the batting order of the team was changed to achieve his purpose and he would continue to do so in the future as well. Changing the team is not the issue. Apart from the unexplained timing, the underlying purposes behind it are certainly important issues.
Until the axe actually fell, Imran Khan and his spokespersons vehemently rejected reports of any reshuffle. They blamed the rumours on the political opposition, aided by ‘lifafa’ journalism. Hours before his fall, the finance minister and others, oozing confidence, ridiculed reports of change. TV channels were served notices by the regulator PEMRA for spreading “fake news” about the cabinet reshuffle. The channels however, sure of the source, refused to budge.
Reportedly the news of the sacking of some ministers was first disclosed to a group of journalists over dinner by a highly placed quarter in Rawalpindi. Using media channels instead of direct and discreet communication between familiar centres of power in the country is already well known. So if the change was decided by ‘others’ and communicated to the prime minister through the media, what was the essence of the message?
The prime minister’s subsequent assertion at a public meeting that ministers “of no use” will be removed seemed a brave face saving mechanism. If it meant public humiliation of trusted lieutenants and also working with a more compromised new panel, it did not matter.
There was no cogent explanation as to why the finance minister was abruptly changed in the midst of negotiations with the IMF, FATF and mid-course in preparations for the budget. That surely was not the best way to turn the economy around. This only strengthened the perception of a puppet government run by puppeteers. An inevitable collateral damage was the prime minister who was weakened. Whether it was by design or inadvertently only time will tell.
There appears a great reliance on nominated and unelected advisors and special assistants, instead of elected representatives. With several unelected people already in the cabinet - like advisors on commerce, institutional reforms, accountability and establishment - the reshuffled cabinet now has 17 special assistants and five advisors, many assigned important portfolios like petroleum, finance and economic matters. The inescapable message was: an incompetent parliament must be side-lined.
The designers of scheme believe that the perception of elected people being incompetent is necessary to ultimately pave way for the dreamed centralised set-up through technocrats. It was not for nothing that lately the propaganda machinery has been busy churning out benefits of ‘Islamic Presidential system.’
A suave Hafeez Sheikh, who earlier held the finance portfolio during the Pakistan People’s Party government, is well-acquainted with the ropes of the international finance institutions. As privatisation minister for General Musharraf, he is also considered close to the military. Sheikh also does not stand on ceremonies, is not averse to visiting the GHQ when summoned and is ready to go the extra mile to meet their demands without asking too many questions.
Imran Khan never met Hafeez Shaikh and senior PTI leaders had publicly accused him, when he was PPP’s finance minister, of incompetence, of being a stooge of the west and a defender of corrupt political masters. It is hard to imagine Sheikh as the first choice of Imran Khan in place of Asad Umar.
A Musharraf-era spymaster, a retired brigadier, mired in controversies for the alleged role in sheltering militants has been appointed as interior minister and tasked to implement the National Action Plan for fighting militants. A bid by Musharraf to appoint him high commissioner to Australia failed as the host government withheld consent. At a time of negotiations with the FATF, this appointment passes comprehension and one has to look deeper into it.
A central feature of Musharraf’s era has been that the military ran the affairs of the state with the help of technocrats. Funds were easily secured from abroad as Musharraf made false promises to eliminate militants by adopting a policy, in the words of Benazir Bhutto, “running with the hare and hunting with the hound.” The centrist mind set yearns to revert to Musharraf’s model. Things, however, have changed in the past decade thanks to the 18th Amendment, when were powers transferred from the Presidency to the Parliament and with incidents like the Dawn leaks.
There are indications that the Punjab chief minister may also be on his way out even though a low-profiled Buzdar has been faithfully implementing the decisions taken at Bani Gala. Imran Khan has stood solidly behind him lately during a party meeting in Bani Gala on Saturday. However, rumours persist that some non-PTI MPA will soon replace Buzdar. If that happens, the provincial Punjab Assembly will also be undermined.
The cabinet reshuffle indicates that an effort is afoot to portray the parliament as weak and incompetent on the one hand and tilt the power equation towards a centralised system on the other. The doors for the dissolution of elected governments and parliaments through Presidency may have been effectively closed by constitutional amendments of the past decade but the machinations do not seem to have ended.
In the mind of the centrists, former ambassador Haqqani recently wrote, “Musharraf’s team was competent because it secured large amounts of western assistance, pledging to fight terrorists while covertly assisting them at the same time. The civilian governments that succeeded Musharraf could not maintain the poker face and were, therefore, incompetent.”
A throw back to the centrist Musharraf era seems to be in the works. The ‘change’ Imran Khan promised is turning out to undo the changes brought about since Musharraf was thrown out of power— a grim pointer of the baffling batting order reshuffle.
The writer is a former senator
The prime minister claims that the batting order of the team was changed to achieve his purpose and he would continue to do so in the future as well. Changing the team is not the issue. Apart from the unexplained timing, the underlying purposes behind it are certainly important issues.
Until the axe actually fell, Imran Khan and his spokespersons vehemently rejected reports of any reshuffle. They blamed the rumours on the political opposition, aided by ‘lifafa’ journalism. Hours before his fall, the finance minister and others, oozing confidence, ridiculed reports of change. TV channels were served notices by the regulator PEMRA for spreading “fake news” about the cabinet reshuffle. The channels however, sure of the source, refused to budge.
Reportedly the news of the sacking of some ministers was first disclosed to a group of journalists over dinner by a highly placed quarter in Rawalpindi. Using media channels instead of direct and discreet communication between familiar centres of power in the country is already well known. So if the change was decided by ‘others’ and communicated to the prime minister through the media, what was the essence of the message?
The prime minister’s subsequent assertion at a public meeting that ministers “of no use” will be removed seemed a brave face saving mechanism. If it meant public humiliation of trusted lieutenants and also working with a more compromised new panel, it did not matter.
There was no cogent explanation as to why the finance minister was abruptly changed in the midst of negotiations with the IMF, FATF and mid-course in preparations for the budget. That surely was not the best way to turn the economy around. This only strengthened the perception of a puppet government run by puppeteers. An inevitable collateral damage was the prime minister who was weakened. Whether it was by design or inadvertently only time will tell.
There appears a great reliance on nominated and unelected advisors and special assistants, instead of elected representatives. With several unelected people already in the cabinet - like advisors on commerce, institutional reforms, accountability and establishment - the reshuffled cabinet now has 17 special assistants and five advisors, many assigned important portfolios like petroleum, finance and economic matters. The inescapable message was: an incompetent parliament must be side-lined.
The designers of scheme believe that the perception of elected people being incompetent is necessary to ultimately pave way for the dreamed centralised set-up through technocrats. It was not for nothing that lately the propaganda machinery has been busy churning out benefits of ‘Islamic Presidential system.’
A suave Hafeez Sheikh, who earlier held the finance portfolio during the Pakistan People’s Party government, is well-acquainted with the ropes of the international finance institutions. As privatisation minister for General Musharraf, he is also considered close to the military. Sheikh also does not stand on ceremonies, is not averse to visiting the GHQ when summoned and is ready to go the extra mile to meet their demands without asking too many questions.
Imran Khan never met Hafeez Shaikh and senior PTI leaders had publicly accused him, when he was PPP’s finance minister, of incompetence, of being a stooge of the west and a defender of corrupt political masters. It is hard to imagine Sheikh as the first choice of Imran Khan in place of Asad Umar.
A Musharraf-era spymaster, a retired brigadier, mired in controversies for the alleged role in sheltering militants has been appointed as interior minister and tasked to implement the National Action Plan for fighting militants. A bid by Musharraf to appoint him high commissioner to Australia failed as the host government withheld consent. At a time of negotiations with the FATF, this appointment passes comprehension and one has to look deeper into it.
A central feature of Musharraf’s era has been that the military ran the affairs of the state with the help of technocrats. Funds were easily secured from abroad as Musharraf made false promises to eliminate militants by adopting a policy, in the words of Benazir Bhutto, “running with the hare and hunting with the hound.” The centrist mind set yearns to revert to Musharraf’s model. Things, however, have changed in the past decade thanks to the 18th Amendment, when were powers transferred from the Presidency to the Parliament and with incidents like the Dawn leaks.
There are indications that the Punjab chief minister may also be on his way out even though a low-profiled Buzdar has been faithfully implementing the decisions taken at Bani Gala. Imran Khan has stood solidly behind him lately during a party meeting in Bani Gala on Saturday. However, rumours persist that some non-PTI MPA will soon replace Buzdar. If that happens, the provincial Punjab Assembly will also be undermined.
The cabinet reshuffle indicates that an effort is afoot to portray the parliament as weak and incompetent on the one hand and tilt the power equation towards a centralised system on the other. The doors for the dissolution of elected governments and parliaments through Presidency may have been effectively closed by constitutional amendments of the past decade but the machinations do not seem to have ended.
In the mind of the centrists, former ambassador Haqqani recently wrote, “Musharraf’s team was competent because it secured large amounts of western assistance, pledging to fight terrorists while covertly assisting them at the same time. The civilian governments that succeeded Musharraf could not maintain the poker face and were, therefore, incompetent.”
A throw back to the centrist Musharraf era seems to be in the works. The ‘change’ Imran Khan promised is turning out to undo the changes brought about since Musharraf was thrown out of power— a grim pointer of the baffling batting order reshuffle.
The writer is a former senator