Embarrassed by spokesperson Major General Asif Ghafoor's frequent Twitter spats and gaffes, the Pakistan Army on Thursday (16 January) replaced him with Major General Babar Iftikhar. He has been posted as the General Officer Commanding of the Army's 40th Infantry Division, based out of Okara in Pakistan's Punjab.
Ghafoor took to Twitter on Thursday and wrote, "Thanks to everyone I have remained associated with during the tenure. My very special thanks to Media all across. Can't thank enough fellow Pakistanis for their love and support." Ghafoor was commissioned into the Pakistani Army on 9 September 1988. He had been the DG ISPR since December 2016, according to the ISPR website.
The General has served on various staff, instructional and command assignments to include Brigade Major Infantry Brigade, Assistant Military Secretary MS Branch, GHQ, Directing Staff Command & Staff College Quetta and Director Military Operations in Military Operations Directorate, GHQ.
Here are five goof ups and gaffes by Asif Ghafoor:
India’s failed moon mission:
After India’s moon landing mission failed, Asif Ghafoor took to Twitter to remind India about the cost they will have to pay further for committing mass human-rights violations in IoK.
Asif Ghafoor to SRK on Bard of Blood series:
Major General Asif Ghafoor hit out at Shah Rukh Khan for producing the Netflix web series Bard of Blood. Ghafoor said Shah Rukh Khan should rather "promote peace" and speak against the "atrocities in Jammu and Kashmir".
"Stay in Bollywood syndrome @iamsrk. For reality see RAW Spy Kulbhushan Jadev, Wing Comd Abhinandan & state of 27 Feb 2019. You could rather promote peace & humanity by speaking against atrocities in IOJ&K and against Hindituva of Nazism obsessed RSS. (sic)" Major General Asif Ghafoor said in his tweet.
Ghafoor hits out at Amit Shah:
After Amit Shah lauded team India for winning a cricket match against Pakistan with a tweet, Ghafoor took umbrage. "Another strike on Pakistan by #TeamIndia and the result is same. Congratulations to the entire team for this superb performance. Every Indian is feeling proud and celebrating this impressive win. #INDvPAK" Shah had written.
In response, Ghafoor said that a match and an airstrike “could not be compared.” But then, he went on to clarify that the claim made by Shah – that the ‘results’ of the match and the strike were the same – was false. He listed how Pakistan had reportedly retaliated and how India’s situation was apparently not one which could be considered victorious:
Burnol
Asif Ghafoor landed in a row, by tweeting inappropriately to a journalist who had questioned the tone of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s speech at the UN General Assembly. Responding to a tweet by political commentator Gul Bukhari, who said that the “world may just disarm Pakistan” after Khan’s nuclear threat, Ghafoor offered her Burnol.
'Vein' as 'vain'
Ghafoor tweeted an open appeal to trolls when he misspelled the word 'vein' in the term 'jugular ‘vein' as 'vain' while quoting then-Army Chief Qamar Javed Bajwa's speech on the situation in Indian-administered Kashmir.
