The General certainly has a plan

• Friday, 03 May 2013 00:00

• Published in Columnists

The Spokesman

Saeed Minhas

Was it a calculated assault by the army chief or was it a full dress rehearsal for a televised speech this nation had seen at least thrice in the past 66 years? Was it an agenda-setting effort by the real players of power in Pakistan or a reminder to all and sundry that the tender shoots of democracy need to be nurtured with diligence and a lot of tolerance for others?
The debate on the chief of army staff’s latest speech has gained such momentum that many political pundits, party heads and even diplomats have started taking it more seriously with each passing day. Already so much has been written and said on General Kayani’s speech that there is hardly any room for more gossip but the content of the speech are so crisp and well-timed that no one with the least interest in Pakistan’s politics can ignore it.
There are several sentiments being aired about his speech. First, it is assumed by many people that General Kayani has done so much to protect this feeble, scandalous and shaky democracy that he deserves a medal, just like General Aslam Beg. Those in favour of this argument claim that despite all temptations, General Kayani has kept his cool and even at occasions where most generals would have ordered the 111- Brigade to move in and seize power, he just stuck to his extended uniform-only status. This argument holds when we look at the five years of the Peoples’ Party led coalition government. The judiciary too was busy throwing open cases of corruption, kickbacks, nepotism, malpractices throughout these years.
First, FATA then Swat and, eventually, Balochistan were all virtually left either at the mercy of the Taliban even when the festering wounds remained politically unattended during Yusuf Raza Gilani’s tenure. The real turning point came with the Kerry Lugar Bill, Osama Bin Laden’s episode, and when the memo-case surfaced to leave the Zardari led party and all coalition partners completely exasperated. Credit goes to the man who resisted all such invitations, despite the fact that we all know who used to seek his audience for a late night cigar and coffee session from among our splintered
political theatre.
Second, it is assumed that every time there is an opportunity to grab power, General Kayani just let it go for the sake of his extended tenure. Just to remind you that here the General is the head of the most powerful institution and not just an individual. We all know that during his open jalsas (gatherings) with the jawans (army men) across the country soon after General Musharraf’s exit and after Osama Bin Laden’s operation, and the Salala check-post incident, he had to face a flurry of difficult questions from his janta. Yet the man known in the media as poker-faced, boiled over to the point of letting that institutional steam exhaust itself.
After each disturbing incident, the General was seen sitting next to the President or the Prime Minister, at times with both. Despite the internal push and pull, he asked his second in command, General Pasha, to brief parliamentarians in-camera about the “war on terror”. Therefore, this segment of his sympathisers believes that the General has done the same thing this time around too. ‘Who can stop him from just stepping in and making the same or a slightly modified speech through PTV by starting with the customary words: Mere Aziz Ham Watano’, commented one political analyst recently.
Yet there is a third set of pundits who believe that the General has laid out his future plan in plain and simple words. If those living in a fool’s paradise believe that the army has changed its ways, they are mistaken, claims this set of people representing mostly retired generals, bureaucrats and even some seasoned journalists. In other words, we can say that all those people who are hopeful of a place in the future technocrats’ set up strongly believe that this was a dummy-run. They believe that sentiments within the army have risen to the level that it is not a matter of extensions at the top, or a matter of another extension. ‘It is simply a matter of deciding between democracy and quasi democracy,’ they  argue.
Every word of the General’s speech was well thought-out and even the pauses were timed. The General responded clearly to all those seeking answers about the role of the Army in creating a Taliban-monster. He addressed the recent judicial challenge to those who abrogated the Constitution. Declaring that the war on terror was our own war was nothing new since he had already mentioned that in his speech on 14 August 2012, but this time there was an addendum attached. For the first time, the General expressed his reservations openly and that too in Urdu, about those opposing this theory of “our own war”. He was categorical about all those people in politics who go about expressing anti American sentiments concerning the war to rouse the people. We are all aware of how Nawaz Sharif, Imran Khan and Maulana Fazalur Rehman have been speaking against the war on the Taliban throughout their election campaign.
The more we go into these details, the more depth we find in the speech made on Yume-Shuhda day. But whether the General was just letting off steam for the sake of those yearning for it or if he was being a real democrat, there seems to be a connection with the post-2014 scenario in the region after
NATO troops pull out and his frequent visitors from the
District of Columbia.
The speech has generated a fourth kind of analysis. This section of the intelligentsia strongly believes that such agenda setting should not be the prerogative of the army. ‘Yes, the military should be consulted over strategic, geographical and foreign policy issues but it should not try to influence the agenda just before an election,’ observed some traditionalists. The General, according to these people, has dictated a road map to the future government. Such policy statements should come from an elected government and not from an institution which, for all theoretical purposes, is not even considered a pillar of the State.
Realistically, since our political nursery has never come out from being under the shadow of the military, especially when a pro-active judiciary is not shying away from forcing its claim on the entire State, it is a bit harsh to ask the army to let all the old habits go. Provided this cajoling and coaxing remains within the constitutional framework, it is likely to help build the stature of our democratic institutions and individuals who lead them.

The writer is Resident Editor at The Spokesman