By Aqeel Yousafzai
The chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Ali Amin Gandapur, has led the provincial administration in launching an ambitious plan to invade Islamabad, the federal capital, using all available resources, as directed by the imprisoned founder of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). Instead, the Pakistan Army’s forces have also moved into action, and the government has made it quite evident that it would not make any more concessions than it has in the past.
The Chief Minister has adopted the practice of using provincial government resources for political point-scoring. This is unprecedented, even though his province is experiencing the worst terrorism in addition to poor government, and a large number of residents are demanding the governor’s rule in the wake of this. In this context, Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif and Governor Faisal Karim Kundi met yesterday. Without a certain, the party and its provincial administration are prepared to go to any lengths to declare war on the state; perhaps this is the state’s way of responding to the party’s recent demonstration of strength. These activities in the name of protests every other week have paralyzed the entire system of the country and Pakistan’s state structure is facing a dangerous kind of political coup.
Barrister Mohammad Ali Saif, spokesperson for the provincial government, called on India to intervene in the situation, which is not just a reaction but an expression of the party’s policy. One such effort is that the party has reached out to Afghanistan’s interim government and even the TTP to intervene against the Pakistani state, and there are not only reports of hundreds of Afghans joining the ongoing resistance but dozens have also been arrested.
The security forces in North Waziristan were conducting a significant operation against militants on the same day that the chief minister was spotted frantically attempting to enter Islamabad. Swat was also the site of the operation. The Pakistan Army killed six terrorists in the operation in North Waziristan, but five soldiers—including a lieutenant colonel—were martyred. In this particular scenario, the provincial government’s recalcitrant stance cannot be justified by any rationale; yet, it is regrettable that the aforementioned party is determined to violate all boundaries.