Shamsa Ashfaq
Election of Donald Trump as the 45th President of the United States of America has marked one of the remarkable events of the year 2016 in international affairs. It is interesting to note that Trump’s election as most powerful President of the world has seen not in US’ perspective but viewed eagerly in Pakistan’s perspective. The reason could be the end of Obama’s tenure and perceived demise of his “Pivot to Asia” policy. Trump administration has widely been projected as challenging, tough and difficult especially for Pakistan both in regional and international media. Unfortunately, all such efforts have bungled up spectacularly. In fact, the Trump presidency may actually be more beneficial or at least benign for Pakistan as compared to a Hillary Clinton presidency.
The relationship between Pakistan and US had gone bad to worse throughout the Obama presidency. It was because Pakistan had close relationship with China, which worked against American strategy to contain China. Among regional neighbours, it was India, which gained central role in Obama’s America policy while progressively downgrading the Pak-US relations. In this backdrop, had Hillary been elected, the Obama legacy would have continued but with Trump in place, divergence from that path is imminent which provided Pakistan a modicum of relief.
Apart all chaos and anarchy caused inside and outside of the United States within days of President Donald Trump assuming charge, not all is lost when it comes to Pak-US relations as indicated by certain critical developments. One of the key developments includes a 20-minute telephonic conversation between Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa and US Defence Secretary James Mattis in which the latter commended the sacrifices and resilience of the people and armed forces of Pakistan and appreciated the role of military in battling the scourge of terrorism. Both reaffirmed the commitment towards the common goal of peace and stability in the region and agreed on continued engagement at multiple levels.
Another crucial development was Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s telephonic conversation with Trump wherein latter’s nice laudatory words expressed about the premier and people of Pakistan were widely disbelieved and ridiculed by the international media. Finally yet importantly, when Trump administration imposed travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries the White House spokesperson stated that there has been no such consideration as extending the visa ban to Pakistan.
Moreover, continuation of some inherited initiatives of cooperation such as the Pak-US Knowledge Corridor, USEP, USAID etc also speak volumes of the scope for Pak-US relations to expand and grow in the future. The continuity of these ongoing initiatives is the key to achieve the agenda of Pakistan Vision 2025 for transforming the country into knowledge economy besides promoting the people-to-people relations. Introduction of modern trends and methods in the TVET sector, up-gradation of curriculum, promotion of linkages with the community colleges of America, instructors’ training are some of the initiatives that will help promote linkages and partnership in technical and vocational sector between Pakistan and America.
A few new developments along with the continuity of ongoing initiatives between Pakistan and US has already helped in improving Pakistan’s image abroad and will likely to further pave the way for greater working relationship at strategic level as well. Pakistan’s economy is reviving as evidenced from the International improved rankings for Pakistan. MSCI ranked Pakistan from the ‘frontier’ state to the ’emerging market’. The Economist in its report described Pakistan as fastest growing economy in the Muslim World. CPEC is transforming the infrastructure and connectivity of the country. It has made Pakistan an attractive destination for investment. Britain, France and Russia, other than China, have shown their willingness to be part of CPEC. In such an environment, the US cannot ignore Pakistan and would certainly engage Pakistan in economic sector. Thus, it is not naïve to say that not all is lost for Pakistan even under Trump.
