Pakistan: Chinese threat to sovereignty

For the past several years China has made many attempts to take total control of the political and economic affairs of Pakistan. And now CPEC providing this opportunity to fulfill Xi Jinping’s draconian plans. The China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) is a project that is primarily connected to a road from Kashgar in China to Gwadar Port in Balochistan, as well as large scale power generation projects with the expansion of roads and rail networks in Pakistan. | The initial cost of which was 46 billion dollars, which has now reached beyond 60 billion dollars. It has not only brought Pakistan to the brink of insolvency but has also raised a serious crisis on its sovereignty. And now a famous Pakistani journalist Ali Salman Andani has warned about the deep crisis hovering over Pakistan. According to an article by Andani published in Asia Times, Prime Minister Khan, who has become a puppet of the military establishment, has deeply damaged the governance system of Pakistan for the interests of China. It is noteworthy that since the arrival of CPEC in 2014, since 2016, Chinese President Xi Jinping started insisting on the establishment of a CPEC authority for all matters related to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and would have brought the projects under their direct control.

Andani believes in Pakistan's Ministry of Planning Development and Special Initiative, one of Pakistan's most important state institutions, and whose senior bureaucrats can clearly investigate Xi's fatal CPEC plan and its ill effects May protested, as they had access to all secret documents associated with the agreement and were, directly and indirectly, involved in the decision-making process. And as long as the reins of this project were under the control of civil institutions under the leadership of civil servants and public representatives, it was not possible for Xi's master plan to be fully implemented. Therefore, the complete removal of such civic institutions would only help Xi to implement his dangerous plans. Such was the secrecy of the agreement that Pakistan's Secretary of Maritime Affairs refused to show it to the Senate Standing Committee on Finance. A clear idea can be made of what this agreement should be like.

Since 2016, President Xi Jinping has pushed for China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and a CPEC authority that would bring the country’s infrastructure and power-generation projects under his direct control. Though the proposal was rejected by the Nawaz Sharif government, it was finally accepted by Prime Minister Imran Khan.

Since 2016, Xi, the general secretary of the Communist Party of China has been forcing the Pakistani Military establishment to put pressure on the government to sideline the Planning Ministry’s role in the implementation and monitoring of the multibillion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC). Xi pushed for the creation of a supra-constitutional CPEC Authority that would freelance the management of the predatory infrastructure and power-generation projects under his direct command. The proposal was rejected then, but last year it was again presented before the prime minister of the country – now Imran Khan. The reason given was timely completion of the projects. This time the prime minister is a full-fledged puppet of the military establishment, and therefore it was easier than before to manipulate the law to fulfill Xi’s desire to take over the Planning Ministry of Pakistan, and in future the country itself.

The alarming situation that Andani describes in this article is that the way this CPEC authority is being strengthened will in the near future become an extra-constitutional body and as a subsidiary organization of the Communist Party of China in Pakistan. Will work and be responsible for conducting, implementing, expanding, controlling, coordinating, monitoring and evaluating all activities related to CPEC. It will become so powerful that any public office holder of Pakistan (including the Prime Minister and President of Pakistan) or any other person who directly or indirectly engages in activities related to CPEC, who willfully resist directions, instructions or specified orders of the CPEC Authority, It will also have the constitutional power to initiate investigations and impose penalties against in this type of actions. Even the powers of the Prime Minister would be limited to the powers specified in the CPEC Authority Bill 2020, so it would have to follow Xi's orders.

China not only lacks democracy, more than it is an enemy of democracy. And Pakistan, which has a very poor record of democracy, is now once again fully prepared to bypass the democratically elected representatives and civil bureaucracy of Pakistan so that China can take on the country's political and economic processes. This is a new process that shows the implication of Pakistan's so-called "sweet relations" with China. At the same time, it is also a matter of learning for countries like Iran, who are the new bait in the line to become a victim of China's debt trap, but indulge in dreaming of Iran's rejuvenation with Chinese cooperation.