President Yahya Khan’s widely expressed hopes that political power will be transferred to the elected representatives of the people of Pakistan by November are unlikely to be fulfilled. The constant deterioration in the internal security situation in East Pakistan, the lack of an effective administrative machine, floods and the threat of famine all operate against a speedy return to civil rule. But perhaps the most important single reason in the eyes of foreign observers is that the Right-wing military clique in Islamabad who rule the country, for whom the President is spokesman, have no real intention of relinquishing one iota of power.

In the group are Major-Gen. Mohammed Akbar Khan, who until recently had a “hot line” into the President’s office as director of the Inter-Service Intelligence Organization and an intimate knowledge of the lives and political legacies of his brother officers; Major-Gen. Gul Hassan, Chief of Staff; Major-Gen. Omar Khan. Another intelligence officer; Lt.-Gen. Tikka Khan, until Sept. 3 Military Governor of East Pakistan; and - the only civilian - Mr. Roedad Khan, head of the State Information Service. The junta have carefully prevented the sordid facts of what happened in East Pakistan from reaching the newspaper-reading public of the West. Many senior civil servants today have no idea how ruthlessly the Army behaved, nor are they aware that villages are still being burnt as reprisals when they are near to the scene of action by Mukti Fouj guerrillas.

TRADE SUFFERS

There will be considerable consternation in the business world of the West when it discovers there will be only a quarter of last year’s jute crop available and, of course, that there will be no market in the East for consumer goods produced in the West as millions have been without work since April and are now unable to buy even their daily ration of rice. Many foreign diplomats believe the President himself has been kept in ignorance of the enormity of the tragedy. Certainly, the oligarchy discouraged Gen. Yahya from visiting Dacca and they virtually prevented Mr. Bhutto, leader of the Pakistan People’s Party, which holds a majority of seats in the National Assembly in the West, from going to Dacca to seek additional political support there.

Gen. Tikka Khan, who was so unpopular as Military Governor of East Pakistan, has been replaced by a civilian - a former Cabinet Minister, Mr. Abdul Malik - as a result of pressure from three widely differing groups of people: United Nations officials, friendly foreign diplomats, and a group of senior West Pakistan officers, whose 100 per cent loyalty to the junta would never be questioned but who nonetheless dared to advocate a more moderate policy towards the Bengal population solely on the grounds of expediency. For the officers claimed that with Gen. Tikka Khan as Governor they could not find suitable candidates willing to stand for the 78 by-elections required to replace those elected members of the National Assembly (who represented the now outlawed Awami League), who have been declared traitors.

The junta makes no secret of the fact that they favour members of the Moslem League, who were unable to obtain a single seat in East Pakistan in the elections of last December. The ruling clique also cherish hopes of bringing together the three main splinter groups of this once influential party, led by the founder of Pakistan, Mohammed Ali Jinnah. But so far their efforts have met with no success in either the Eastern or Western wings of the country. Another alternative favoured by Islamabad to what Mr. Bhutto has described as the President’s attempts “to put three corpses in one coffin” was to encourage the Pakistan Democratic Party of Nurul Amin, who was one of the two members elected to the National Assembly in the East, who were not supporters of the Awami League. But this elderly ex- Prime Minister has lost all his drive.

A former chief of the Pakistan Air Force, Air Marshal Asghar Khan, whose party is sufficiently favoured by the junta to enable him to visit Dacca, wants the National Assembly to be “involved in some way” in the drafting of the constitution, but he lacks support and party machinery. The appointment of Mr. Malik will certainly render the work of UN officials and foreign diplomats in East Pakistan far easier and it may encourage a handful of candidates to come forward for the by-elections. But it will make no influence on the Bengali population, which is Bangladesh to a man. Indeed, as a Bengali working for the junta, Malik, in the eyes of the vast majority of the population of East Pakistan, is merely a quisling.

Islam can no longer be effectively used by the junta as a force to bring the peoples of the West and the East together. The Koran may still have an appeal to the simple people of the more remote parts of the countryside, but it is not an important factor in the lives of Bengali intellectuals, or even the literate clerks, shopkeepers and farmers. Indeed, short of letting Sheikh Mujibur Rahman out of prison and allowing the Awami League to function once more - a possibility than can be ruled out while the present junta are in power - there seems no way in which the two wings of the country could ever operate peacefully again.

The cost of the military occupation of the Eastern Wing, the crisis and chaos there, must soon make their impact on the political scene in the West, where Mr. Bhutto is, without question, the only outstanding figure Mr. Bhutto, whose attitude to India is hawkish enough to please the junta has been building up to a head-on political confrontation with the President since he made a statement to the correspondent of Kayhan International on July 16 in Tehran which was cut to ribbons by the Pakistan censor. In it, Mr. Bhutto demanded a return to “democratic life and civilian rule.” He claimed that “only civilians could achieve a political settlement.” Since then he has “served notice” on President Yahya Khan that he expects him to redeem a promise made last June to restore civilian government “within two months”, and appoint him Prime Minister. Further, Mr. Bhutto has threatened the junta that if they attempt to establish “a puppet military Government” he will overthrow it by raising a mass movement in the West.

GROWING MENACE

The clash between Bhutto and the junta is daily growing in momentum. Mr. Bhutto is concerned that some of his followers are beginning to fall away as the fruits of office recede further into the background, but he is aware that his support among the middle ranks of the Army officers - majors and colonels - is menacing to the ruling clique; owing to literacy requirements many of the officers taken into the Army immediately after Partition came from the urban middle classes and a considerable proportion of these men and the soldiers serving under them, are attracted by Bhutto’s anti-Indian, but Left-wing, approach to politics.

For, although the morale of the Army is now high, pressure groups have almost unconsciously been formed of officers who feel the long-term interests of Pakistan are not being served by the men at the helm in Islamabad. Like the French Army in occupation of Algeria a decade ago, there are officers who see that the “tough” approach - the burning of villages - merely creates more refugees and swells the ranks of the Mukti Fouj. The point has not yet been reached when the Army is divided on whether the Bengalis should be allowed their independence. And, despite hints from his friends that he is ready, the former President Ayub Khan is no de Gaulle waiting in the wings.

But Plagued with desperate economic problems, worried by the recent pact between India and the Soviet Union, the junta must within the next few months announce a bold and constructive policy and hand over power to Bhutto and the politicians. There are frequent rumours of a coup de’etat in Islamabad, and one before Christmas cannot be ruled out.