A creeping ‘coup’ is on in Pakistan
is not a new development in Pakistan.
The JIT was created following a split 3-2 judgment of the supreme court. Two of the judges had called for the immediate disqualification of the prime minister basing their judgment on Articles 62 and 63 of the constitution. These articles are the residues of the violence General Zia had inflicted on the 1973 constitution. Article 62 provides for a prime minister who is ‘Sadiq’ (truthful) and 63 that he be ‘Ameen’ (righteous). In the minority judgment, Sharif passed neither test. The JIT report is now back with the supreme court, which has reserved its judgment but it can reasonably be expected in the coming weeks, if not days.
Between these two diametrically opposed narratives is a middle argument. Sharif is paying the price of his own hubris and arrogance in taking on the army—the Musharraf trail, siding with the Jang/Geo group in its tangle with a DG, ISI, the Dawn Leaks case in General Raheel Sharif’s last months in office, etc. That in each of these and other similar instances the prime minister persisted despite knowing the results of earlier encounters was no less than a form of lunacy and he will now have to count the costs. What he possibly did not take into account was how much the army had risen in public esteem after Operation Zarbe-Azb and the decline thereafter in terrorist attacks within Pakistan.
Those who smell a creeping coup in the air point to the role accountability and anti-corruption has played since the 1970s in tilting the civil military equation in a particular direction. This thesis gets a further fillip because many of those leading the legal and political charge against Sharif have, with merit, been identified in the past as the Pakistan military’s advance scouting parties.
Pakistan has within its grasp an important milestone which falls next year — the first ever completion of a full term by an elected prime minister. Whether it will sacrifice this on the altar of a mythical probity in public life remains to be seen. It is possible that this may happen because what is also clear is there are many in Pakistan with a predisposition to choose dreams over reality.