By Tom Costello
Pakistan has been in international news over recent weeks for a combination of state repression and war. The military dictatorship of General Asim Munir has overseen the arrest of hundreds of opposition figures, with the latest sentencing of 108 activists, MPs and leaders of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party in August.
Flames of war
The regime’s latest budget, passed in June, included deep cuts to the public sector, sackings, redundancies and privatisations under the domination of institutions like the IMF. The country’s poverty rate sits at 44.7% according to the World Bank, which is likely a significant underestimate. Yet the regime still found room for another 18% increase in funding for the military. The overwhelming majority of state spending goes not on servicing the needs of the country’s people, but on paying off imperialist foreign debts and militarism.
This comes at a time where the regional tensions between Pakistan and India have inflamed. In May the two countries, both nuclear-armed powers, traded missile fire over four days, ultimately claiming the lives of 82 people on both sides of the border. Although the trigger for these events was the killing of 26 tourists in Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, the underlying cause is to be found in how the ruling classes of both countries rely on warmongering and nationalism to shore up their positions. It is also a reflection of the wider conflict between the US and China, who are both vying for influence in the region.
There is no ‘good side’ for the working class in this conflict. The only forces benefiting from these wars are the capitalists, the military establishment and the imperialists, while working-class and poor people in India and Pakistan both lose.
Khan popular
Pakistan is also in the throes of a deep political crisis, where the authority of the two main political families – the hated Sharifs and Bhuttos – along with that of the military establishment are widely questioned. The beneficiary of this has been Imran Khan and the PTI. His status as a political prisoner, combined with his populist rhetoric, has won him the status of most popular politician in Pakistan. Were a free election held today, Khan and the PTI would almost certainly be swept to power.
Khan is seen by many, especially among his base within the urban middle classes, as an ‘honest voice’ who didn’t play by the rules of the military and US imperialism, which is reinforced by Khan himself who employs anti-American rhetoric from his prison cell. But despite his falling out with the military top brass, his record is still that of a politician wedded to capitalism.
After being installed by the military in another rigged ‘election’ in 2018, Khan showed his true colours. Far from building an ‘Islamic welfare state’ and ending corruption as he pledged, his government was marked by authoritarian repression, jailings of opponents and activists, brutal suppression of national minorities, combined with harsh neoliberal austerity policies. However, his time came to an end when he fell out of favour with the generals. In some ways this wasn’t unique – Khan was the 22nd Prime Minister of Pakistan to be deposed before finishing his term – however what was unique was the way in which it played out.
Reminiscent of Trump, Khan’s time in office saw him routinely sidelining the institutions of the Pakistani state, trying to elevate himself to the position of ‘strongman’. He attempted to assert some independence from US foreign policy and to ally Pakistan more closely with Russian imperialism. However, when the military attacked Khan for his ‘disloyalty’ and moved against him, it backfired for them spectacularly, turning him into an unlikely focal point for the masses’ discontent.
A tinderbox
The combination of explosive material – corruption, poverty, splits within the ruling elite and conflict between the US and China – make Pakistan a tinderbox waiting to explode. The country could well become one of the next examples of a revolutionary movement in the neocolonial world. In recent years, this has included Sri Lanka’s 2022 uprising which drove out the Rajapaksa regime, the pro-democracy mass movement in Bangladesh of 2024, and most recently the continuing youth revolt currently rocking Kenya.
To be successful, a new mass movement against the generals and imperialism would need to harness the strength of Pakistan’s mighty working class. To avoid the dead end that many such protests have ended up in, what is needed is not another millionaire populist, but a real party of the working class and poor, armed with a socialist programme to uproot poverty, repression, corruption and inequality across the region.
Such a party would need to boldly fight for the full liberation of women and stand for the rights of all oppressed nations in the region (Kashmiris, Pashtuns, Balochs etc.) to self-determination. Rejecting communalism and sectarian division, it would need to reach out to and build links with workers’ and small farmers’ organisations in neighbouring countries as a show of workers’ unity against capitalism and imperialism.
A socialist programme would mean refusing to pay the crippling debts to both Western and Chinese imperialism. It would mean seizing key industries and placing them under democratic control. Changing the situation requires taking into public ownership the commanding heights of Pakistan’s economy, including agriculture and major industries, to be run in the interests of the people, not the capitalists.
