Each few years, Pakistan performs its democratic ritual with rallies, ballots, and prime ministers sworn in with guarantees of reform. And each few years, the phantasm fades. Energy, as ever, lies elsewhere: within the garrison city of Rawalpindi, the place the military writes the actual script of the state.
The newest proof of this has come by way of Monetary Instances, which reported that Pakistani officers have proposed that america assist construct a port at Pasni, a fishing city alongside the Arabian Sea. The plan to show it into an export hub for crucial minerals feels like an financial mission, however the actual message is revealed by who the messenge is. It was not the civilian authorities making the supply, however the advisers to Discipline Marshal Asim Munir, the highly effective Military Chief of Pakistan.
For many who have watched Pakistan’s politics lengthy sufficient, that’s hardly information. The nation’s generals have spent a long time stepping in when elected leaders stumble, reshaping constitutions, and reminding everybody who actually governs.
The Navy Mindset
The military’s dominance is older than Pakistan’s democracy itself. Born from Partition’s chaos and outlined by its early battle with India over Kashmir, the brand new nation noticed insecurity not as a problem to be overcome however as its organising precept. The military turned probably the most trusted, disciplined, and funded establishment of the state, and shortly, probably the most political.
Civilian politics, in the meantime, splintered into character cults and patronage networks. Bureaucracies decayed, courts deferred, and events fractured alongside ethnic traces. The army, disciplined and united, got here to see itself because the nation’s solely competent custodian and made a behavior of intervention.
By 1958, Common Ayub Khan had already normalised coups. His successors, Yahya Khan, Zia-ul-Haq, and Pervez Musharraf, every justified their takeover as patriotic obligation. Every rewrote the structure, abandoning a system through which civilian governments regarded non permanent and the army everlasting.
A State Inside a State
In contrast to most militaries, Pakistan’s armed forces don’t merely eat the nationwide price range; in addition they personal a substantial a part of it. By the Fauji Basis, Bahria Basis, and Military Welfare Belief, the establishment controls companies in the whole lot from cement and banking to actual property and fertilisers. Tutorial Ayesha Siddiqa as soon as estimated these holdings account for greater than seven per cent of GDP.
The privileges are mirrored within the price range sheets. In 2024–25, Pakistan spent about 1.7 trillion rupees on defence, practically twice what it allotted to well being and training mixed. In a rustic the place the World Financial institution says 40 per cent of residents reside beneath the poverty line, this imbalance speaks volumes.
The Hybrid Behavior
Pervez Musharraf’s coup on October 12, 1999 past toppling the federal government, created a political method of his so-called “managed democracy”, the place elected civilians operate underneath army supervision. This turned Pakistan’s default setting.
20 years later, that mannequin continues to be intact. Imran Khan’s ascent in 2018 bore the military’s tacit blessing; his fall 4 years later carried its unmistakable shadow. Judicial rulings and parliamentary votes offered the theatre. The script, nonetheless, was military-authored.
Now, underneath Discipline Marshal Asim Munir, the choreography continues. The military influences financial choices, safety operations, and international outreach. The Pasni port proposal is just the newest reminder. It echoes Musharraf’s personal bid to court docket Washington after 9/11, buying and selling strategic cooperation for {dollars} and diplomatic favour.
Democracy On Brief Leash
The civilian price of this association is seen in every single place. No prime minister has ever accomplished a full five-year time period in Pakistan. Cupboards rotate, alliances splinter, and elected leaders defer to unelected authority. Those that resist, from Zulfikar Ali Bhutto to Imran Khan, uncover how swiftly the institution can flip its equipment towards them.
The implications transcend politics. Improvement stagnates, debt balloons, and social spending stays an afterthought. A system that rewards army stewardship inevitably starves the civilian state.
The generals current themselves as saviours of a nation they by no means actually permit to control itself. Discipline Marshal Munir, like Musharraf earlier than him, seeks Western engagement to handle an financial disaster and reassert the army’s indispensability. The playbook hasn’t modified; solely the vocabulary has. “Reform,” “stability,” and “funding” have changed “safety,” “order,” and “rescue,” however the logic stays the identical.
Till energy actually shifts from the cantonment to the parliament, Pakistan will proceed to reside underneath the identical unwritten structure the place the generals rule, and the civilians serve at their pleasure.