Senator Kakar is caretaker Pak PM ahead of poll

Sandeep Dikshit

Advertisement

New Delhi, August 12

A pro-establishment Pashtun from Balochistan, Senator Anwar-ul-Haq Kakar, was on Saturday appointed the caretaker Prime Minister of Pakistan till the next General Election is held.

Kakar (52) was a founding leader of the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP), which was in a political alliance with Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). Kakar and BAP quickly switchedsides once the army did not support Imran Khan in a no-confidence vote in April this year, leading to his ouster.

Born in 1971 in Qila Saifullah district, which is named after a chief of his branch from the Kakar tribe, Kakar is an alumnus of the University of Balochistan. Incidentally, Hindu members of the Kakar tribe also lived in Qila Saifullah but migrated to Rajasthan after Partition.

Kakar’s BAP was formed with dissidents from the PML (Nawaz) and the PML (Qaid) in 2018 and mirrored the rise of the PTI in the country. It is today a leading party in Balochistan in a pro-establishment coalition government and it also won seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Kakar’s name was agreed upon during the final day of consultations between outgoing Pakistan PM Shehbaz Sharif and the Leader of Opposition in the dissolved National Assembly, Raja Riaz Ahmad.

Riaz said, “We decided that the interim PM would be from a smaller province” and claimed that he had suggested the name. Sharif thanked Riaz for his cooperation during the consultation process. The apparent bonhomie concealed considerable behind-the-scenes jockeying with as many as six names in contention.

Under Pakistan’s Constitution, the President appoints the caretaker PM in consultation with the outgoing PM and the Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly.