Frankly, there is no way to know. The media, except for that part of it which projects the government narrative, was blanked out.
There was no dearth of social media stories, but it was impossible to sift facts from fiction. But two bits of video footage, though they were insufficient to tell the whole story, nevertheless gave a lie to the story now being put out by the high command. Added to them are certain bits of sure knowledge that cannot be denied. When you put all this together, some conclusions can reasonably be arrived at.
The two video clips I have referred to are:
- The video of the mob attack on the residence of Commander 4 Corps Lahore. What stands out in this video is:
- The mob attacking the house was a sparse one.
- Those guarding the house should have been at least a platoon strength [30], but not more than two could be seen.
- No police or paramilitary force could be seen near the site under attack. It must be concluded therefore that intelligence agencies covering this area were inactive.
[ And further, highly credible sources say that military checkpoints guarding routes into the cantonment, always very alert, were either not manned, or were very lax. But I cannot confirm this point because the video in question did not attest to this.]
- In case of the attack on GHQ as well, the video footage shows a commonality with the points enumerated above, except that in this case the “crowd” was even thinner.
The question that next arises is whether mob action should have been expected upon the arrest of Imran Khan? Anyone answering this in the negative should feel himself qualified to be put into a monkey cage.
The next question is whether the army had good reason to expect that Imran Khan would be arrested on May 9nth?
The answer lies in the following facts:
- Lt Gen Nazir Butt of NAB ordered I. K’s arrest. He was so keen to affect his arrest that he let his enthusiasm override good sense, and ordered an arrest which was illegal. There is no question that he must have informed Gen Asim Munir about this. But just in case he did not, the intelligence boys covering NAB would have reported this without any doubt.
- I.K was arrested, not by the police, but by a contingent of Rangers. Rangers may operate under orders of the provincial government, but they are commanded by serving army officers. Anyone who has the slightest knowledge of how the army functions, would know that there is absolutely no chance that Commander Rangers would not have informed the Army High Command of such a consequential action. But even if he did not do so, the intelligence boys in his outfit would certainly have done so.
- Imran Khan was arrested in a manner which was especially humiliating. Without the Ranger Command getting a direct order from Gen Asim Munir to proceed in such a manner, this would have been impossible.
Therefore, it may fairly be concluded that:
- There should never have been any doubt that I. K’s arrest would spark widespread protests which may lead to mob violence.
- And that the army, if it was not orchestrating drama, at the very least certainly knew that this arrest would be carried out on May 9nth. Given the above, the most obvious action by the army should have been to alert the intelligence agencies; to DOUBLE the guard at places like GHQ and at Jinnah House Lahore; and to deploy extra checkpoints on routes leading to points like these.
But what really happened in practice?
The guards seemed to have been all but withdrawn, and any intelligence there was, seems to have been disregarded, so that they did not alert the police or any paramilitary force to come to the relief of the points of mob attack! And despite arson, not a fire engine was in sight.
In other words, this was like deploying the army to meet an Indian attack in a certain area, but withdrawing it from the defenses just before the attack was launched.
And where were all the big players when the unthinkable was unfolding on May 9nth? Well, the PM was in London; the Army Chief in Qatar; and Gen Butt of NAB was doing an Umra, praying on behalf of all three for the success of the operation!
This reminded me of Woody Allen’s famous quip: ” I’m not afraid of death, but I don’t want to be there when it happens!”
And then inevitably on May 15nth, the Corps Commanders collected in GHQ to clear their throats. What they left in the wake of their departure was sulfur in the form of a new narrative. In short, this narrative informed the people that the army was fully prepared to go into yet another attack against the people who did not believe in their story and refused to lie down and curl up. They forgot all over again that an overwhelming majority of Pakistan belongs in this category of extreme skeptics.
But there was one spark of brightness in the statement issued by GHQ after their meeting had concluded. This lay in their advice to all stakeholders that they should evolve a consensus on how to move forward and bring stability to Pakistan.
This was a very good suggestion. But there is a better one. Why don’t we first begin with an issue which doesn’t need a consensus? An issue on which the framers of the Constitution had already reached a consensus and recorded the same in the Constitution itself? And they have done so in a manner which leaves no loophole, leeway, or option, but to have elections in NO MORE THAN NINETY DAYS after the dissolution of an assembly!
Is it not true that the only people who cannot understand this clause of the constitution are those who have already gutted the Constitution? And further, is it not true that those who have gutted it are a group of thugs foisted to govern us, and those who jockeyed them into this position and are now bent on keeping them there?
Can this whole cabal pool their sparse reserves of honesty and just answer these two questions truthfully, before they go cocking their rifles and aiming them at those who are guilty only of not believing them?