Pakistanis Rise Up Against Ruling Elite as Misery Multiplies
In almost every corner of Pakistan, anger at the ruling elite is nearing a boiling point.
Thousands have protested soaring electricity bills just outside the capital, Islamabad. In a major port city in the southwest, dozens have clashed with security officers over what they described as forced disappearances of activists. In the northwest, protesters have admonished the country’s generals for a recent surge in terrorist attacks.
The demonstrations over the past few weeks reflect frustration with Pakistan’s shaky, five-month-old government and with its military, the country’s ultimate authority. The unrest threatens to plunge Pakistan back into the depths of political turmoil that has flared in recent years and that many had hoped would subside after the February general election.
Pakistan’s leaders are confronted with a monsoon of problems. The economy is suffering its worst crisis in decades. Anger at an election widely viewed as manipulated by the military remains palpable. Militant violence has roared back after the Taliban’s return to power in neighboring Afghanistan. And Pakistani politics are more polarized than ever, with the country’s most popular political figure sitting in jail after a bitter rift with the military.
The administration of the current prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, has struggled to establish its legitimacy and has been criticized as little more than a front for the military.
Since Mr. Sharif first came into office in 2022, Pakistan’s generals have wielded an increasingly heavy hand to quash dissent. A national firewall has been installed to censor internet content, the social media platform X has been blocked, security forces have arrested political opponents in droves, and generals have been installed in key positions in the civilian government.
“It’s more than hybrid rule,” said Zahid Hussain, a political analyst in Islamabad, referring to the old informal power-sharing dynamic between civilian and military leaders. “This arrangement is military rule with civilian facade.”
Government officials have pushed back against that characterization of their relationship with the military and sought to remind the public that dealing with the storm of challenges will take time. They have stressed that the economy in particular is on the path to recovery. Inflation is easing, the state bank recently lowered interest rates, and government officials are expected to hammer out the details of a new bailout from the International Monetary Fund in the coming months.
“The economy is showing a positive outlook” and is “getting stable,” said Aqeel Malik, an adviser to the prime minister on law and justice. “We have only been in power for a few months,” he added. “We don’t have a magic wand.”
Still, the growing public unrest is a worrying sign for a weak coalition government that few expect to survive a full five-year term — a feat that no prime minister in Pakistan has ever pulled off.
On Monday in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a northwestern province bordering Afghanistan, hundreds of people gathered in the latest protest against the surge in terrorist attacks by groups including the Pakistani Taliban and the local Islamic State affiliate. “Go, go, go to the border,” protesters chanted, urging the military to focus on security rather than domestic politics.
The same day in Gwadar, a city in Baluchistan Province that is home to a port built and operated by the Chinese, at least three people were killed as security forces engaged in a standoff with thousands of protesters. The demonstration demanded an end to a paramilitary crackdown on activists from the Baluch ethnic minority, who oppose what they call outside exploitation of the region’s resources, and came weeks after the government announced that it would bolster security for Chinese workers at the port.
And in Rawalpindi, a city just outside Islamabad where the military’s headquarters is situated, thousands of protesters affiliated with an Islamist political party gathered for days to express anger over the rising cost of living. The government recently raised electricity prices by 20 percent, a step that officials called necessary to comply with a $7 billion loan agreement with the International Monetary Fund.
“The military establishment, ruling families, judiciary and bureaucracy have ruined our lives and our future,” said Muhammad Arif Bashir, a protester from Taunsa Sharif, a remote area of Punjab Province, who had traveled to Rawalpindi. “But now enough is enough.”
The recent focus on the economy and security concerns is a striking shift for a country that has been consumed by a single political issue over the past two years: the ouster and imprisonment of former Prime Minister Imran Khan.
Pakistani politics have been paralyzed by Mr. Khan’s fall from grace in 2022 after butting heads with the generals and his subsequent resurrection as a political force even from behind bars. After his ouster, Mr. Khan rallied hundreds of thousands to the streets and stirred a once unimaginable show of resistance to the military. Mr. Khan has accused the generals of orchestrating his ouster and his arrest last year, which military officials deny. He remains in prison on what he claims are politically motivated charges.
The drama that followed his removal from office — including violent protests targeting military installations, an apparent assassination attempt, his conviction and imprisonment on a long list of charges, and a military crackdown on his supporters — has dominated the country’s political conversation.
The swell of protests now over issues unrelated to Mr. Khan, and organized by civil and political leaders outside his party, shows how public outrage has spread far beyond his support base or political agenda.
Analysts say the unrest has deepened as the government and the military have neglected the issues driving the protests and focused instead on stamping out Mr. Khan’s political party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or P.T.I.
Last month, the governing coalition said it would ban P.T.I. In recent days, the authorities have arrested several top party officials, including members of P.T.I.’s prolific social media team, which the Interior Ministry has accused of peddling “anti-state propaganda.”
On Tuesday, Mr. Khan said during a court hearing in Adiala Jail, where he is being held, that he was open to negotiating with the military, according to local media reports. Mr. Khan may see an opening, given the government’s deep unpopularity, to negotiate a deal that paves a way out of jail and back into politics, analysts said.
Even if he does so, it is far from certain whether that will satisfy the millions of Pakistanis who are not among his followers but are deeply dissatisfied with the status quo.
“We have been striving hard to make ends meet, and the ruling elite in Pakistan treats us like second-class citizens,” said Syed Khaliqur Rehman, a businessman from Karachi, the country’s largest city, who joined the protests in Rawalpindi. “We are done with all of this.”
Zia ur-Rehman contributed reporting.
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