Islamabad, Pakistan: The recent Amendment to the Services Act by the Parliament has been well received by people from all walks of life especially members of the Armed Forces community.
With almost all having consensus on the fact that three years tenure for the Services Chiefs is too little to affect any long-term changes; enhancement of the same to five years will assist in addressing such obvious predicaments.
On the other hand, credible senior sources in the military have confided that another major shortcoming for a relatively limited tenure of three years was the availability of more controls with political forces who had been maintaining intrusive influence over the military i.e. politicization of the military.
When compared with other modern militaries of the world, this enhancement in the service limit of the service chiefs is nothing new but in line with them. For example, in the US it is 4 years, UK 3-4 years, China 5 years, Germany 3-5 years & France 4 years.
Also, several researchers in the world vividly enunciate that a relatively longer period of service chiefs assists in making militaries independent and immune from interference from the outside world. Thus, Chiefs can make decisions that benefit not only the militaries alone in the mid to long term but also assist the countries as a whole.
Notwithstanding the above, this enhanced tenure limit of the Services Chiefs will definitely accrue several other important advantages as well including a continuation of policies, adequate time for implementation of a perceived vision, greater stability, and bridging trust deficit between the Government and the Services Chiefs which has been bitter at times in the past in Pakistan.
In sum, this enhancement in the age limit of Service Chiefs will further add to the professionalism of the Armed Forces while making the institution immune to interference by the political parties while providing additional leverage to the Chiefs for maintaining intrusive influence over military affairs – a win-win situation both for the Armed Forces & the country alike.
