Journalist and talk show host Saleem Safi on Saturday claimed that Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Qamar Javed Bajwa has refused to help Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan in getting an early election in the country.
In a column published by Daily Jang, the journalist said that the army chief recently held a meeting with the PTI chief at the President House in Islamabad after the latter repeatedly requested the former through different influential personalities for a meeting.
During the meeting, Saleem Safi wrote, Imran requested the COAS to hold snap polls in the country after toppling the PML-N-led government. He said the army chief rejected Imran’s request, saying the army cannot repeat the mistake of playing an unconstitutional role for the PTI.
Safi claimed that the general also told Imran Khan that the PTI’s economic policies and foreign conspiracy narrative had badly damaged the country. “The army chief told Imran and the president that the military does not want enmity with the PTI despite all its efforts to divide the institution…. General Bajwa made it clear to them that the army cannot help them in getting snap polls,” he wrote in the column.
The columnist added the army chief in that meeting held that if differences develop among the coalition parties and the government collapses on its own or if the political parties unanimously decide to hold early elections after economic stability, then the army will not stand in the way.
General Bajwa, however, suggested Imran to go back to the Parliament, Saleem said, adding that the meeting ended without any result.
Does the return of Ishaq Dar suggest that the general towards the end of his reign has finally relented to ID’s demand of fiscal discipline. 5 years of voluntary exile is a longtime for him to stand by it and the issues reported by Khurram Hussain in ‘Dar and general’ need a revisit.