Imran Khan is not the Pakistani establishment’s only problem. In fact, when compared to the unmanageable conditions in Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provinces, Khan appears to be a minor issue. They are a bigger headache that is growing consistently and will require a more strategic foresight.
While the Pakistani state considers Balochistan to be a site of problematic insurgency, problems in KP, since the 1980s, have always been looked at from the lens of terrorism and counter-insurgency. And now the KP Chief Minister has separated the province from the state further by engaging independently with Afghanistan.
The recent KP police protest demanding that the military be pulled out from the province is another thorn in the state’s side. It appears to be an intra-institutional battle that requires careful political foresight. But that is sadly deficient.
Also read: With Faiz Hameed’s arrest, Pakistan Army has punished one of their own. It’s a warning
Accusations against the army
Police in the Lakki-Marwat and Bannu districts in the southern part of KP are up in arms, claiming that they will only be able to manage terrorist threats and the Tehreek-e-Talibaan Pakistan (TTP) problem if the army is withdrawn. Although mainstream media claims that the police’s four-day sit-in has ended, local reports indicate that tensions continue. The police claim that they are unable to counter extremism in the province because militants have links with the army units. Local sources say the police have given a week to 12 days’ notice for the withdrawal of the army from Bannu.
There are multiple YouTube videos in Pashto circulating on social media that present the anxiety of the local policemen. Additionally, they claim that the army attacks and kills police, indicating that they’re coordinating with TTP militants.
It is this devious coordination that the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM) led by Manzoor Pashteen has been protesting for the last few years.
Sources I spoke to claimed that people, particularly in the tribal areas, do not believe that there is an actual conflict between the army and the TTP and that people in these areas and KP at large are being sacrificed for the state’s politics. They say that this is being done to keep the Pashtuns divided.
Not surprisingly, the PTM has called for a national jirga (meeting of leaders) to be held next month. The idea is to get local leaders of the area together and highlight the machinations of the state’s security forces.
Even the PTI-led provincial government appears belligerent. The KP assembly recently passed a resolution calling for the court martial of army officers involved in interfering in politics. Though no officer has been named, it points in the direction of the current army chief, Asim Munir, and his cabal.
Furthermore, the PTI has announced a rally in Lahore on 21 September. If the party manages to repeat the turnout of the Islamabad rally last week, it shows that it still poses a challenge in the political conflict with the army chief. Given that a lot of participants in the Lahore rally may be from the party’s main support base in KP, it will further bolster the anti-state and anti-army attitude in the northwest province.
Also read: Chinese influence is growing in Pakistan’s Gwadar. No access for local Baloch people
Undermining the state
But what’s happening in KP is far more interesting than PTI versus Rawalpindi politics. The KP government is now side-stepping the federal government by initiating talks with Kabul. The KP Chief Minister, Ali Amin Gandapur, announced he would talk independently with the Taliban government in Afghanistan. In his statement, made at a session of the bar council, he said that since the state is unable to solve the problems faced by his provincial government, he would have his own dialogue with Kabul.
Afterwards, he met with the Afghan council general, Mohibullah Shaki, in Peshawar to discuss matters between the two regions.
Gandapur’s idea may not necessarily be bad for managing Pakistan-Afghanistan relations. Apart from security, issues of Pakistan-Afghanistan trade, and the security and wellbeing of Afghan nationals in KP also have to be ironed out. Given the general lack of trust between Kabul and Islamabad, especially regarding security matters and handling of the TTP, it makes sense for the KP government to look after these matters. If Gandapur manages to engage Kabul based on common Afghan-Pashtun heritage and gets them to agree to rein in the TTP, it will be beneficial for Islamabad as well.
However, some of the Afghan-Pakistan observers and journalists I spoke with remain sceptical of the idea that the KP chief minister is not in the army’s control. They claim that Gandapur has to present himself in opposition to Islamabad and the army to satisfy his support base with whom such a tone is popular.
This may sound like a political tactic but there is a heavy cost for the state—the Pashtuns in KP are becoming less tolerant of the army and the Pakistani state. It’s not just because the province was used for so many decades to accommodate the army’s geopolitics, the Mujahideen and then the Taliban in this area, but also because the state has never attempted to understand Pashtun culture.
People in KP may have issues with Kabul’s policies but there is a broader cultural comradery with the Afghans. Even Gandapur spoke about the ethnic and cultural links between Afghans and Pashtuns of Pakistan—most Pashtuns ethnically identify themselves with Afghans.
Even though over 20 per cent of Pakistan’s military is Pashtun and they are well represented in bureaucracy, the gap between a Punjab-dominated state and Pashtun people is increasing.
This internal divide would mean that the tactical approach of having an independent conversation between Peshawar and Kabul is ultimately more dangerous for the Pakistani state. It indicates an almost-death of the federal structure, an inadvertent signalling to the general public of KP that, while they have a conflictual relationship with the federal government, they can engage independently with those they have an ethnic commonality.
What this means is that even though the KP chief minister’s dialogue with Kabul could provide a temporary solution, it will create a larger problem of strengthening links between Pashtuns across the border. This formula adds legitimacy to a confederation between KP and Afghanistan. Not to forget, the Pakistan government had refused the idea of a confederation between Pakistan, Iran and Afghanistan which was presented by the Shah of Iran during the 1960s. Interestingly, it is Imran Khan’s centrist party that is now inadvertently making the case for links with Kabul. Something that Rawalpindi wouldn’t allow the leftist PTM to do.
Pakistan’s security establishment has always been wary of the cross-border Pashtun ties, which they fear spurs the idea of a greater Pashtunistan. This is also the reason that the army has always preferred to have ties with Islamic militants from across the border as opposed to non-religious Pashtun political movements. Unfortunately, the state seems to be digging a bigger hole with these policies.
Ayesha Siddiqa is Senior Fellow at the Department of War Studies at King’s College, London. She is the author of Military Inc. She tweets @iamthedrifter. Views are personal.
(Edited by Theres Sudeep)