Senior journalist Najam Sethi has claimed that Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Qamar Javed Bajwa recently “summoned” six cabinet ministers of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and put forth three topics for “some plain talking”.
While the veteran journalist did not name the ministers, according to him, the PTI government’s “abysmal performance” was discussed as what was hurting the image of the military and other bigwigs.
Sethi claimed that removal of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) chief ministers (CMs), and the need for the federal government to constitute a more efficient and credible team “at least for putting the economy on track”, was also discussed.
“Time’s running out, he implied darkly,” the journalist claimed in his The Friday Times editorial.
“As a consequence of such ‘advice’, Imran Khan has blithely sacked Nadeem Babar and Hafeez Shaikh, even though he was lauding their singular expertise not so long ago. Indeed, he had pitched Mr Shaikh to the Senate so that he could continue as full-fledged minister of finance.”
He further wrote, “Some more chopping and changing is on the cards. But given Imran Khan’s track record of picking his political teammates, we shouldn’t expect any qualitative improvement in performance.”
Sethi also opined that change in Punjab, in particular, “would be a hard bone to swallow”.
