Pakistan’s former prime minister Imran Khan has demanded an “internal military inquiry” into former army chief General (retd) Qamar Javed Bajwa for his alleged “confession” of involvement in the ouster of his government.
In an interview , Khan again said, “PML-N, PDM (Pakistan Democratic Movement) and the establishment are on one side… they all together removed our government and Gen Bajwa admitted to regime change because he spoke to journalists about the reasons for which the government was dismissed. He referred to the remarks of Gen. Bajwy published in a recent column. In it, Bajwa said his “crime” was not stepping in to save Khan’s government. It was also quoted that “these people (Khan-led Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) were dangerous to the country”.
“Now he himself said that he removed the government because according to what he said, the country was in danger,” Khan said.
When asked about the army chief’s admission that the army had become involved in politics. Khan said: “There should be an internal army inquiry against him because of the statements he made proudly and arrogantly that ‘I took the decision because the conditions in the country were such’. as if he were some kind of economic expert.”
Khan said that the main principle of the balance of power is that an elected government that has responsibility must also have authority, arguing that no system of governance works if the two are separated.
Since his ouster in a parliamentary no-confidence vote last April, the 70-year-old Khan has faced public rifts with the military, despite previously enjoying a close relationship with the country’s most powerful institution.
Taking a swipe at General Bajwa, he said the former army chief “favored some of the biggest crooks in the country” and did not see corruption as a big problem.
“He wanted us to work with them. What it meant was to give them immunity from their corruption cases,” he claimed, adding that Gen Bajwa has a “very close” relationship with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif.
“And for some reason he conspired and there was a regime change,” Khan said in an interview broadcast on Saturday.
He said the main principle of balance of power is that the elected government must also have authority.
“You cannot separate responsibility and authority. So if the authority rests with the army chief [but] the responsibility rests with the prime minister, no governance system works,” he said.
Responding to a question, Khan said the new military leadership had realized that “the regime change experiment has failed”.
“I’m sure the new military leadership realizes that this regime change experiment has gone wrong.” Pakistan’s economy has hit a tailspin, we are facing the worst crisis in our history, an economic crisis, but not only a crisis of governance, and there is no way out of it,” he said.
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