Establishment besieged

Powerful generals have always had queues of politicos, who like extras of cheap theatres, were on call to play their small parts in silly puppet shows. Those queues have shrunk...

The ongoing Fold-up Imran Project seems to be headed towards the same fate as the earlier Bring Imran for 10-years Project i.e., great expectations, grim results.

One consequence of the launch of Imran Khan and his elevation to the office of prime minister in 2018 was the forced birth of the legend that “Khan is Essential”. That was a lie. The present attempt at winding up that lie has, ironically, started to produce another legend: Khan is Invincible. This is a lie too, but for now, the Establishment is confronted with a situation where more and more people seem to believe it.

This is not how it was supposed to be. Post 9 May events last year, Imran was to suffer utter ruination. And, for a while, he appeared to be on the verge of annihilation. His party started to dissipate. Stalwarts jumped ship. Military courts grabbed suspects of the riots by the neck. Hundreds were sent to seemingly endless custody. He was thrown into the jar and convicted of financial fraud and abuse of authority. Even his marriage was declared to be procedurally defective. With the army's high command repeatedly vowing to bring those who attacked the “state” to stern justice, Imran looked set to face his hour of reckoning.

But since Feb 8 polls, and even earlier, the crippling vise gripping Imran Khan had started to loosen. The attempt to separate him from his party didn’t succeed. The effort to produce an electorally-endorsed hybrid system on 8th Feb has ended up creating a federal government that is toothless and internally conflicted. Now most of Imran’s stalwarts are back in political play. Murad Saeed lectures on principled politics, Umar Ayub on the values of democracy, and Hammad Azhar fakes the virtues of Fidel Castro.

His party occupies the maximum airtime. Social media platforms amplify his message of defiance across the land and beyond borders to an already charged expatriate community. His chief minister in KP openly threatens to take over the federal territory and “free Imran” by force. He and his sisters name the army chief in their murder plot allegations but inside elected assemblies, the mantra of reconciliation and dialogue with Imran is becoming louder and louder. Meanwhile, Imran himself is taking the high ground. Every second day he pours scorn over the imagined deals that are being offered to him. There is no evidence that the Establishment is engaging him but the fact that the chatter of ‘talk to Imran’ is increasing indicates that he has been able to re-brand his image from a goner to a returner. His jail has become his ops room from where he strategizes his next raid on the Establishment and contemplates his media moves. He is a man back to his usual work.

Isn’t it a remarkable turn of events in less than 10 days from the May 9th riots’ first anniversary? It seems to be so. But scratch the surface and you will find that it is not so much Imran the Unassailable as Establishment the Over-manipulator that is fundamentally driving this outcome.

It is not love for Imran but bottled-up anger against the Establishment that is at play here. To begin with, everyone is exhausted by the endless manipulation of the system. While the country has been putty in the hands of the Establishment for a long time, in launching Imran Khan, the generals sucked the patience out of every other institution. Elections were rigged; judges were bought off; parties were broken apart and new ones were created; Imran’s opponents were ripped apart; religious fanaticism was unleashed; media was hijacked and columns and columns of fifth columnists were launched to march around the land announcing the arrival of the savior. That was the Imran for 10-years Project. It did bring him to the office but it compressed everyone else to zone zero.

This was the age of the Bajwas, Faizs, Ghafoors, paid trolls (all revolutionaries now), and pitiable men like Nisars and Khosas. Bleeding swords in hand, they all hunted for Imran’s opponents to chop and quarter. The long-term cost of this guillotining of normal politics and derangement of society has come in the shape of exhaustion and silent rebellion which mealy-mouthed parties like the Pakistan Muslim League-N and the Peoples Party are not capitalizing on but which is filling minds with hate and anger. Now that the Establishment is attempting to dismantle the Imran Network, the usual instruments of control and rigging to achieve the results aren’t complying.

The judiciary and the legal community are in revolt. The six judges’ letter captures the spirit of the times when the most reliable partner in the Establishment’s political crimes, the judiciary, is saying enough is enough. The media’s control for building “favorable narratives” is neutralized by a feisty, combative, and often slippery social media that has shown sustained resilience against moves to control its content. The other co-players of the Establishment’s hunger games, political parties, too aren’t primed for their usual command performance. Some, like the JUI of Maulana Fazlur Rehman, have discovered to their horror how dispensable they can be even when they play ball with the Establishment. Others like the PPP now ask for their pound of flesh in power, privilege, and positions. For the likes of the PML-N, the Establishment’s friendship is a sin of decreasing pleasure. As former victims, they are never sure whether they hate the Establishment or love it. Others such as the MQM are biding their time for a revival that would put them past the need for total reliance on the Establishment’s hand to stay afloat.

Outside their doors, powerful generals have always had queues of politicos, who like extras of cheap theatres, were on call to play their small parts in silly puppet shows. Those queues have shrunk and now include small-timers who have no public value. Put differently, an overbearing, overly manipulative Establishment is reaping what it has been sowing. It has cut the very tree its throne has been nestled in for decades.

Those raised as part of the Imran for 10-years Project have turned against their master whom they detest for betraying them. Imran is the commander of the army of jilted beloveds. Nine out of ten media trolls belong to the brigades that were raised and funded in Pindi. They together with the endless farce of manipulated elections and new experiments in hybridism have unleashed a powerful momentum that has laid siege on the Establishment. The momentum is growing. But is the Establishment worried? Its core men say they are not. And they cite interesting reasons to explain their composure. Not all reasons are convincing but they are there. What are the reasons? This you will read about in the next piece.