The fears of a payment defect pushed the leader of the influential Pakistani army to ask for the help of Washington to push the IMF to unlock as quickly as possible a disbursement of more than $ 1 billion.
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Pakistan still needs the help of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). And the fears that Islamabad is lacking this year, according to the same path as Sri Lanka, seem more and more founded. If the country has obtained a preliminary agreement with the IMF for the disbursement of a slice of around 1.2 billion dollars (about 1 , 2 billion euros), political disorders, and in particular the agitation led by former Prime Minister Imran Khan, could endanger this rescue buoy. The former cricket star had been forced to leave power after the vote of a censure motion on April 9.
Sign of emergency: General Qamar Javed Bajwa, the leader of the very influential Pakistani army who has led the country for more than half of the last sixty-five years, went directly to it. according to the economic daily Nikkei Asia and the American agency Associated Press, he would have maintained himself, at the end of July, with number two in the department D ‘American state, Wendy Sherman, in order to ask Washington’s help to push the IMF to unlock the loan in question as quickly as possible.
The request is surprising to say the least with regard to the distended relationship that the Pakistani army has in recent years with the United States, especially on the question of neighboring Afghanistan, fell into the hands of the Taliban, on 15 August 2021. The spokesperson for the Pakistani Foreign Ministry of Affairs, for his part, confirmed, on July 29, that General Bajwa had been in contact with American officials, without specifying the subject of interaction.
Pressure coalition
This episode strengthens the perception that “civil governments are perceived as perpetual subordinates of the security establishment, unable to make independent decisions”, regrets The Pakistani daily Dawn in an editorial published on Monday 1 > August. Especially since the heterogeneous coalition of the Prime Minister, Shehbaz Sharif, undergoes the constant pressures of his rival, the ex-deputy minister. The rivals of Imran Khan had managed to form a coalition in April, in particular thanks to a handful of deputies from his camp having defeated.
Since then, the 69-year-old ex-playboy has continued to wave the masses claiming early elections. Imran Khan has managed to bring together crowds across the country with anti -American rhetoric funds. Mr. Khan says his fall is the result of a conspiracy supported by the United States. Proof of the echo he has in the country on July 17, his party won 15 of the 20 seats in provincial elections in Punjab, the country’s most populous region, generally considered a political barometer.
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