The early withdrawal folks and NATO forces from Afghanistan are going to be a serious concern for Islamabad because the cross border attacks in KP and Balochistan are likely to extend as both the Taliban and therefore the Afghan government are going to battle it out for Kabul on Durand Line.
The pandemonium in Pakistan National Assembly (PNA) during a debate on budget on Tuesday with treasury and opposition benches hurling objects and shouting expletives reflects the lack of the Imran Khan government to stem the rising political chaos within the country.
Even though the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) government is unlikely to face any credible political threat from either opposition alliance PDM or PML-N, which itself is embroiled in an indoor tussle, it's the infighting within the ruling party including depression and rampant corruption which are weighing the ruling party down.
Senior politician from Pakistan's Punjab province, and a key member of the PTI, Jahangir Tareen, broke faraway from the ruling party in May, forming his own faction with around 35 like-minded lawmakers from national and provincial assemblies.
Tareen, who has been implicated during a corruption case, is taken into account on the brink of the country's junta . A businessman and sugar tycoon, Tareen is understood to possess wooed many an politicians to hitch Khan’s party, helping him win the elections that made him the prime minister in 2018.
Another worrying factor for PM Khan is that the involvement of members of the govt within the Rawalpindi bypass scam. it's been alleged in local news reports that billions of dollars were made in property deals as a part of the project since its conception in 2017. This has severely dented the credibility of Imran Khan’s anti-corruption crusade and therefore the promised vision of Naya Pakistan.
Despite all this, the Pakistan government put the present opposition leader within the National Assembly, Shahbaz Sharif, on a no-fly list. Sharif had a writ allowing him to travel abroad for medical reasons. Investigation agencies have also been directed to reopen a decade-old corruption case against Sharif brothers, which had been decisively closed by the court. Shahbaz Sharif has served as chief minister of Punjab and has close ties with the military.
Apart from this, spiralling inflation, cries of misgovernance and growing unpopularity of the PTI government has put strains on the military's relationship with Imran Khan.
The government's claims a few 3.9% rate of growth of the country's GDP has been challenged by the opposition and has called it fraudulent. Fact is that Pakistan’s economy continues to be caught up with repayment pressures on account of external debt as a results of which Islamabad has sought restructuring of USD 3 billion debt from China and therefore the circular debt of the facility sector includes USD 1.3 billion arrears of the Chinese power companies.
To add to the discomfort of the Imran Khan government is that the internal security situation with increasing terror activities - mainly in Balochistan, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP), Sindh and Punjab. Baloch insurgents still attack security forces, their alleged informants and workers of the China Pakistan Economic Corridor project. Sunni terror groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba/Jamaat-ud-Dawah, Jaish-e-Mohammed and their affiliates still operate freely publicly with impunity.
Khan has made counter moves to consolidate his political standing by scuttling the military's efforts to interact the opposition and even whipping public sentiments on relations with India in direct contravention of the military chief Gen Qamar Javed Bajwa’s nuanced efforts to tone things down between the 2 countries. As a result, hybrid arrangement remains during a state of physiological state and therefore the military's stake in Imran Khan is steadily declining with diminishing returns.
What caused a significant dent within the relation between the military and therefore the civilian government is that the ruling dispensation's showcasing of success stories within the policy sphere like the May 7-9 visit by Imran Khan to Saudi Arabia on the invitation of prince Mohammed bin Salman. The visit was held under the watchful eyes of Pakistan army chief General Bajwa, who reached Saudi Arabia earlier on May 4, but the very fact was underplayed.
There was also tons of noise within the local media over Islamabad’s pro-active role in support of Palestine within the Israel-Palestine conflict. On the opposite hand a crucial meeting between Pakistan NSA Moeed Yusuf and US NSA Jake Sullivan in Geneva was played down despite the very fact that the previous offered special economic incentives to US during a bid to succeed in bent the Biden administration.
The early withdrawal folks and NATO forces from Afghanistan getting to be|are"> are going to be a serious concern for Islamabad because the cross border attacks in KP and Balochistan are likely to extend as both the Taliban and therefore the Afghan government are going to battle it out for Kabul on Durand Line. The spill-over of the forthcoming battle for Kabul will increase instability in Pakistan.
