“Whether you agree or not, the system we have been living under has collapsed.”

These were the extraordinary words of the Interior Minister of Pakistan, Syed Mohsin Naqvi, while addressing the Pakistan Economic Summit on 30th July 2026 in Islamabad. He further stated that there was “only one solution” to improving the country’s overall condition: “You will have to take [the matter of] administrative units, provinces or whatever you may call it, to the public.”

The above statements, coming from a man who has been in power since February 2023, first as Chief Minister of Punjab and then the Interior Minister, cannot be dismissed as another political statement. They deserve serious national debate.

Pakistan is the 5th largest country and the only nuclear-armed Muslim country. It is situated in one of the most sensitive areas on the planet, bordered by China, Iran, Afghanistan and India. What happens inside Pakistan rarely remains confined within its borders.

Thus, its governance debate is not merely an internal debate. Political instability, economic challenges, terrorism, demographic pressures and institutional dysfunction can have consequences far beyond Pakistan.

Pakistan inherited the governance structures of the British Raj on 14th August 1947. East Pakistan was nearly 1,600 km away from Pakistan, with India in between. Unfortunately, instead of developing a governance model which would safeguard the interests of both parts and ensure close integration, the West Pakistan elite created the One Unit system, combining all the provinces of West Pakistan on 14th October 1955 to offset the demographic imbalance between the two wings.

The Constitution of 1956 further compounded the problem by giving an equal number of seats........

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