Gilani prefers continuity to change in Army's top structure

“The term of the President, the Prime Minister and the Chief Justice is till 2013. The term of the Chief of Army Staff [COAS] has also been extended to 2013. Now all have secure positions and should work as per the Constitution,” Premier Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani told the media on Friday; 15 hours after he went on national television to announce the three-year extension of General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani's term. That said, Mr. Gilani left the media interaction. But, then he had said it all. He had admitted that the extension — widely covered in the international media — was an “insurance policy” to borrow a phrase used by journalist Nusrat Javed on his show. The decision itself did not take many by surprise because this has been in the air for a while now. What did surprise many, though, was the duration of the extension. Still, the response has been muted; both from the Opposition and the Pakistani media, which is ever ready to put the government in the dock on every issue. While part of the reason is the Army's continuing clout over Pakistani polity, where the military establishment remains a sacrosanct institution seldom put under the scanner, there is evident grudging respect for the way General Kayani has conducted himself over the past three years which saw the country return to a democratic framework but has been beset with problems the ruling elite appears to be blind to. In fact — in a country prone to conspiracy theories — there have been whispers of the establishment planning to put together a “national government of technocrats.” These “persistent rumours” of an “unholy alliance of the new power troika in Pakistan — generals, judges and the media — to undo the current malfunctioning system and establish a ‘national government of technocrats' to steer the country…” were echoed recently in The Friday Timeseditorial also. So, it didn't require the Prime Minister's candour to establish that stability in the political arrangement was the primary reason for the government preferring continuity to change in the Army's top command structure. “There was risk in change in the present context and caution prevailed,” explained the former Secretary (Defence Production), Ministry of Defence, Talat Masood.