A broken power accord

ALTHOUGH the PTI has postponed its protest march on Islamabad, the capital city’s container-blocked roads continue to reflect the country’s deeper crisis. The crisis is not merely political, economic, or security-related; it is rooted in an elite class that cannot forge an accord within themselves.

Islamabad is not witnessing a siege-like situation for the first time; it has become part of life for the inhabitants of the twin cities. Even a cricket match or a visiting dignitary can bring life to a standstill. Despite huge investments in infrastructure and expensive surveillance systems, the security providers remain nervous. They have turned the federal capital into a city of checkpoints, where the average citizen must pass through long queues every 10 minutes during his daily commute — with police officers regarding him with suspicious eyes. Citizens end up feeling that they themselves are responsible for all the country’s ills, while those who have actually encroached on green belts, footpaths, and even highways escape punishment for crimes they do not even understand. The crisis runs deep, and even the postponement of the protest by the PTI, and earlier by the Jamaat-i-Islami, will not solve the country’s political, governance, economic, and security crisis.

These lines may seem cynical, but the streets of the federal capital tell Pakistan’s whole story. The ‘container-ment’ approach shows serious fractures among the power elites over the division of power, which has not been shared proportionately and has, in fact, caused a chronic political crisis and led to a rent-seeking economy. Rent-seeking means economic actors become adept at obtaining privileged access to the state or controlling scarce resources.

The masses are not responsible for the country’s state of affairs; it is fractured power elites who have yet to learn the art of distributing power among themselves. Here, another term needs explaining. The ‘fractured elite’ comprises Pakistan’s dominant political, civil-military, judicial, and institutional elite — sometimes referred to as the establishment — when it no longer agrees on the basic rules of the political game. The elite includes religious and ideological authorities, but in an evolving power order, their role and share have been minimised for now. Major businesses and landed interests have become important actors within the fractured power order.

Serious fractures exist among the elites over the division of power.

A question arises: what does an elite power accord look like? Is it about who will have the political power to govern, and under what conditions? Another question emerges: aside from political power, who holds the real power, also referred to as institutional power? Does this authority belong to parliament, the executive, the military, the judiciary, or the bureaucracy? Institutional power brings control over major economic resources and rents, as well as coercive or security institutions. It also has territorial power to determine how the interests of the centre and the provinces are accommodated. Among the elites, succession remains a key question: how will power change hands? A linked challenge arises. How are influential groups accommodated? Foreign policy remains the exclusive domain of the power elites — what strategic interests are considered non-negotiable?

Now look at the Pakistani elites, which have failed to define the role of political power. Gradually, an institution has assumed authority, while the ruling political parties have surrendered several rights to retain power. The opposition, meanwhile, is demanding its legitimate rights. Many political analysts arguably contend that the opposition, now led by the PTI, along with smaller parties within the opposition alliance, the Tehreek-i-Tahaffuz-i-Ayeen-i-Pakistan, is struggling for power rather than restoring or developing a new social contract in the country. Maulana Fazlur Rahman’s JUI-F is also part of the opposition. It has been marginalised in the power structure because the changing rules in the power playbook leave less space for religious actors now.

The political power structure has clearly failed to advance nationhood, and power remains confined to one major influential ethnic group in the country. Those who represent the power structure in the public discourse and the social and mainstream media malign less powerful and marginalised groups, suggesting they go to Afghanistan — their remarks target both the Pakhtuns and the Baloch. They stigmatise the Kashmiris as well, who have been demanding their rights in Azad Kashmir. If state propagandists are suggesting a course of action for them, where are they supposed to go?

Fractured power elites cannot create cohesion within a nation. They cannot resolve their internal discord, so how can they devise a broad formula for national cohesion? In their paranoid view, security has taken over dialogue, and they have grown accustomed to killing an ant with a hammer. Even when clear indications show dialogue is the best policy, power elites know it would mean accommodating new members in the power club and remain hesitant to admit newcomers.

A lack of flexibility or capacity for dialogue creates a need for a hyper-coercive internal security order. An internal security review is underway to make it more coercive. KP has resisted somewhat by introducing the Police Act, 2026, which will bring provincial government oversight over the system, as was required in the KP context, where discord between the police and other institutions has become challenging. But the federal government is resisting it. It seems the power elites will not compromise on the new internal security order and will continue to push their agenda through Nacta or the interior ministry. Foreign policy and geopolitics are sensitive domains for public discourse in the country. The parameters of non-negotiable interests continue to blur and narrow.

For the masses, the crisis in the country is no more than a long, tragic soap opera on screen, which they can watch, cry over, and laugh at, but cannot act on.

The writer is a security analyst.

Published in Dawn, September 27th, 2026