No plan of sacking Kayani, Pasha: Gilani

PM claims PPP is not threat­ened by PTI’s rise.

KARACHI / ISLAMABAD: Amidst strained relations with the powerful security establishment, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani on Monday sought to quell widespread rumours that the government planned to sack the army and intelligence chiefs as a last resort in the Memogate controversy.

“The government does not want to remove or replace the Chief of Army Staff [Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani] or Director General of the Inter-Services Intelligence [Lt Gen Ahmed Shuja Pasha],” Gilani said in an interaction with journalists.

Both the army and intelligence chiefs, said the prime minister, were appointed during a war-like situation and they cannot be removed while the country is still fighting the war. “We cannot change a general in the middle of a war,” he added and claimed credit for giving extension in tenures to the two generals.

Gilani quashed talk of a confrontation between the government and the military establishment saying that the “political situation is completely under control.”

Last week, Gen Kayani, in an unusual statement, also trashed the speculations about a military takeover and said that such rumours were being circulated to divert public attention from real issues. He did not name who he thought was behind the rumours.

Memogate case

The prime minister said that since the Memogate was a matter of national security, he had referred it to the parliamentary committee on national security for investigations without wasting time. He also asked then-Pakistani ambassador to the US Husain Haqqani to resign and return to Pakistan, so that proper investigations into the case could be started. “Before I would ask for it, Haqqani had submitted his resignation which I accepted immediately,” Gilani explained.

Pakistan-US relations

Gilani also spoke at length about the frosty relations with the United States. He said that the government was waiting for Pakistan Army’s inquiry report into the November 26 Nato air raid in Mohmand Agency which killed two dozen soldiers.

“Once the army releases its investigation’s details, we will discuss the matter with all the stakeholders and decide on the future terms of relationship with the US,” he said.

On Thursday, a Nato investigation into the deadly airstrike concluded that both the Brussels-based alliance and Pakistani forces made mistakes in the incident.

PTI’s growing popularity

The prime minister also tried to downplay any worries the ruling party may be having over the rapid political ascent of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf.

In his successful rally in Karachi, Imran had referred to President Asif Ali Zardari as “retired hurt” a criticism to which Gilani responded by saying that the president had been in politics for a very long time and knew how to guide his party without being in the limelight.

Asked whether or not the PTI was getting support from the security establishment as is being claimed by some political observers, the premier said that all he knew was “a king’s party survives till the time the king is around. Once the king is gone, the party dies out.”

In the past, the Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid) was accused of being a ‘king’s party’, for most believed that it was handpicked by Musharraf in an effort to legitimise his rule.

Situation in Balochistan

About the deteriorating security situation in Balochistan and growing sense of alienation among its people, the prime minister said that his government has already declared 2012 as the ‘year of Balochistan.’

He said his government has made substantial efforts to improve the situation in Balochistan but explained that “if a little is left undone, it will take us back to square one.”

According to the prime minister, the only major issue that remains unsolved is the issue of security, which he admitted at times, gets beyond the government’s control. “A state is responsible for providing security to its citizens and if it fails, then the people have every right to be upset about it,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 27^th, 2011.