ISLAMABAD: Defense Minister Khawaja Asif said on Monday a new army chief would be announced by November 26, days before the current head of the military, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, retires on November 29.
Pakistan’s army has ruled the country for nearly half of its 75-year history, and even when not in power is considered the invisible guiding hand in politics.
The appointment of a new army chief, arguably the most powerful man in the country, will have a crucial bearing on the future of the South Asian nation’s burgeoning democracy, and set the tone for relations with India, Afghanistan, China and the United States.
“General Bajwa will retire on December 29, but the new army chief will be notified before that, by the 26th of this month,” Asif said in an interview to a Pakistani news channel.
He explained that as per tradition, the Prime Minister’s Office had sent a letter to the Ministry of Defense as well as to the army headquarters, GHQ, to send dossiers of the top contenders for the army chief’s post.
“The GHQ will send names and dossiers detailing the services of all prospective candidates for the post of army chief,” Asif said.
“A summary [of candidates’ names] prepared by the defense ministry [and sent to PMO] is a tradition and the process has no legal constraints … In my opinion, PM Shehbaz [Sharif] should be following this tradition.”
Among the main contenders for the army chief post are Lieutenants-Generals Asim Munir, the army’s quartermaster general, Azhar Abbas, the chief of general staff, Nauman Mahmood, president of the National Defense University, and Faiz Hameed, the former chief of Pakistan’s premier Inter-Services Intelligence agency and currently the commander of the army’s Bahawalpur Corps.
Asif’s repeated comments in the last week that the new chief would be appointed by November 25 have given rise to widespread speculation that the government’s choice is Gen Munir, who is technically the senior-most of the top generals in the army but is set to retire on November 27, two days before the incumbent hangs up his uniform. He thus needs to be appointed before November 27 in order to become chief.
An army chief’s tenure is for three years from the date of appointment, but they often obtain extensions, as did Bajwa in 2019.
