Pakistan democracy 'hollow and distorted': European Think Tank

According to a European think-tank, Pakistan Railway Minister Sheikh Rasheed Ahmad's statement on the Katarpur corridor exposes the elemental dysfunctionality of the country's government.

The Amsterdam-based think-tank, European Foundation for South Asian Studies (EFSAS), in a statement released on Friday, December 6, called the Kartarpur corridor 'a ray of light' for the democratic relations between India and Pakistan.

Faultlines Exposed 

However, Ahmed on November 30 told reporters in Lahore that the opening of the corridor was the brainchild of Pakistan Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa. According to EFSAS, Ahmed left little to the mind's eye while making the statement and exposed how "hollow and distorted" Pak's democracy is.

Ahmed said, “India will remember forever the kind of wound inflicted on it by General Bajwa by opening the Kartarpur corridor. General Bajwa strongly hit India by opening the corridor. Through this project, Pakistan has created a new environment of peace and won itself love of the Sikh community”. 

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Dynamics of Pakistan governance

The think-tank also said that the dynamics of Pakistan government was "laid starkly bare" by the Minister when he confirmed that his statements were fueled with the widely held view in the country. Ahmed confirmed that the Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan was a 'selected' head of the country as opposed to 'elected' and was "firmly under the thumb of the authority" which appointed him.

According to EFSAS, PM Khan is "merely a rubber stamp" for the decisions dictated by the Army Chief. The European think-tank believes that Ahmed's statements would have been more understandable if they were made by someone in the army. However, Ahmed chose to credit the Army Chief and not the Prime Minister "spoke volumes" about the faultlines in Pakistan's democratic structure. 

EFSAS posted on their official website,  "for an elected representative, a Federal Minister, and a close aide of the Prime Minister, to credit, without batting an eyelid, the Army Chief and not his boss, the Prime Minister, for the most meaningful decision taken in recent times to improve relations with India, speaks volumes about the nature and scope of dysfunction in the Pakistani State, as also about how hollow and distorted its ‘democracy’ is."

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(With agency inputs)