I’ve heard one description of Imran Khan that I must share. It’s about his threat to dissolve the KP and Punjab Assemblies. One wag described like the youth who climbs on the roof his house and threatens to jump unless his parents agree to marry him. I’m not sure if the protest is over the delay in his marriage in general, or if he has a particular bride in mind, but the threat has got the young man stuck. If he jumps, he might make his parents very sad, but he’ll be dead. If he comes down without getting his demands met, he’ll be a laughingstock.
Imran did end his Long March with the threat of dissolution, but now the CMs who have to sign the actual advices to the respective Governors are apparently having doubts. KP CM Mahmood Khan seems quite clear in his district of Punjab CM Parvez Elahi. Mahmood will dissolve only after Ch Parvez does. I don’t if Mahmood’s sending Ch Parvez frantic secret messages not to dissolve if he values his life, but he has come out and said that the members want their development funds to bear fruit before going to the polls.
He doesn’t want to dissolve before March. At that time, the pressure will then be on not to dissolve, but to pass a Budget first. Punjab and KP wait for the federal budget to be presented first, but the groundwork is done before, so if the provinces can violate the same-day election convention, thry can probably violate the convention of the federal government presenting its budget first. That means the budgets would be presented by mid-May at the earliest. Presenting it won’t be enough. It has to be passed. And then there’s the supplementary budget. That has to be presented and passed. All in all, we’re looking at June.
And if we get to June, we’ll have a chorus of voices saying that the tenure of the assemblies end in July, so why not wait a bit and have same-day elections after all? Besides, dissolution would mean that the CM and the Leader of the Opposition have to agree on the caretaker CM. As the Opposition Leaders are corrupt elements, Imran won\t allow the CMs to sully their purity by talking to them. The decision on the caretaker CM will have to be taken by the Election Commission.
Now Imran knows (especially after the decisions in the foreign funding and Toshakhana cases) that the CEC is a corrupt element. So the caretaker CMs, instead of giving positive results, might even be hostile. The same CEC will conduct the elections.So far, in the by-elections since July, Imran has been sweeping all before him, but that has not let the CEC off the hook. A|nyway, even if there is no early dissolution, the CEC will remain. So dissolving the Punjab and KP assemblies will hace the same problem.
If you ask me, the CEC is Imran’s fallback. If he loses the election, he can always tell his supporters that he lost because the CEC rigged the elections against the PTI.
While there has been much ink spilt in praise of the new COAS, Gen Asim Munir, the pages of history do not give ground for reassurance. Not that there’s anything wrong with General Munir, but the last time someone named Asim became head of the Army, it didn’t end all that well.
Kh Asim, better known to history as Samsamud Daulah, was the son of a religious scholar, but grew close to the Mughal prince who would become the Emperor Farrukh Siyar because of his skills in wrestling and archery. When the Syed brothers made Farrukh Siyar Emperor, he became commander of the Army. He was one of those Mughal generals who got beaten by Nadir Shah when he invaded India and sacked Delhi.
He was one of the men who was supposed to confront the Syed brothers. He failed miserably. His patron, Farrukh-Siyar, has been called physically the most impressive of the Mughals. The Syed brothers ultimately killed him after holding him captive. But Samsamud Daulah retained office, and went on to serve the next Emperor.
