Asif Zardari felicitates Gen Bajwa for taking charge as COAS

On the other hand, General Zubair Mehmood Hayat has assumed charge as the Chairman of Joint Chiefs Staff Committee (CJCSC) today in a ceremony that was held in GHQ earlier in the day.

General Bajwa will receive the traditional baton of command from outgoing army chief General Raheel Sharif at a ceremony at army headquarters in Rawalpindi next week, according to an announcement from the prime minister’s office.

Sharif, appointed army chief in 2013, had refused an extension, unlike his predecessor General Ashfaq Kayani, who had got a three-year extension.

Last week, setting at rest weeks of intense speculation, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had appointed Bajwa, a career infantry officer from the Baloch Regiment, as Pakistan’s 16th army chief.

General Bajwa, Khan said, had the command of the most sensitive corps of Pakistan during the sit-in and his decision to send troops to secure the Red Zone in Islamabad was a clear demonstration that no action should be allowed to take place that might threaten democracy.

As he continued to take the line of denying India conducted any surgical strikes in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir, he dramatised the Pakistan army’s capabilities. In August 2011, Gen. Bajwa was awarded the Hilal-i-Imtiaz (Military), which is the second highest civilian award and honour given to both civilians and military officers of the Pakistan armed forces.

The PM and President praised the services of Raheel Sharif for the country. Pakistan’s Air Chief of Staff, Air Chief Marshal Sohail Aman and Naval Chief Admiral Zakaullah also echoed his sentiment.

Still, critics said that the civilian-military power balance remains extremely lopsided and that Pakistan’s security agencies will continue to control foreign and military policies.

“#COAS designate Gen Qamar Bajwa has zero presence on social media”.

Gen Bajwa will face challenges ranging from an increasingly hostile India to the conflict in Afghanistan, growing links between homegrown militants and ISIL, and blowback from a Trump presidency. “I want to make it clear to India that taking our policy of constraint and patience as any sign of weakness will prove unsafe for itself”, he said.

Finally, in terms of civil-military relations in Pakistan, the timely transition between the Sharif and Bajwa suggests that the civilian government maintains its primacy for now.