Pakistan is at a perilous moment as it faces a political crisis pitting opposition leader Imran Khan against the government and military in the middle of an economic crisis demanding the full attention of the country’s rulers.
Khan’s arrest on corruption charges last week was overturned by the supreme court and he threatens to organise mass resistance and demonstrations if rearrested after his bail expires. That might tempt the country’s powerful military to intervene ahead of autumn elections, in fear of seeing a vengeful Khan victorious against them. The military have dominated political leaders for decades and also control large sectors of the economy. They cultivated Khan himself as a sympathetic candidate in 2018, before turning on him three years later. The present dispute is highly personal between him and the army chief of staff General Asim Munir. Khan hopes to split the military and then swing them back towards himself by mobilising popular feeling.
These manoeuvres are happening ahead of a looming default in payment of an International Monetary Fund loan that would imperil Pakistan’s chances of securing longer term international support. Inflation and interest rates are spiralling as the currency has fallen one third against the dollar. Khan swung opportunistically against Western interests while in power and appeals to conservative Muslim movements. Pakistan’s overall alignment with China opens up geopolitical competition from the political crisis. It is a serious complication for a nuclear armed state of 230 million people.
Khan is voicing democratic dissatisfaction with military domination and bringing unusual protests to their sites and residences. The governing coalition led by Khan’s long-standing rival Shehbaz Sharif rejects his demands for early elections and still resents the cavalier way they were treated by Khan when he was in power.
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This crisis brings politics and economics uncomfortably together for rulers and citizens alike in a volatile mix of factionalism and popular impatience.