Reports from the Pakistani press suggest that the directive had come from no less than Asif Ali Zardari, the co-chair of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP), the senior partner of the current ruling coalition. Zardari has reason to dislike the ISI. Shortly before her tragic demise, his wife, Benazir Bhutto, had made no secret of her unhappiness with the functioning of the organisation and had promised to render it more accountable to civilian authority. Also, based upon Pakistani press accounts, the decision to move the ISI's reporting line to the interior ministry was undertaken without being discussed in a cabinet meeting.
Obviously, in a democratic state, any intelligence agency, however shadowy, must be accountable to elected authority. However, the attempt to so abruptly place it under the interior ministry without consulting the military was both inept and careless. The newly elected (and unelected) members of the civilian regime in Pakistan may well have many legitimate grievances against both the ISI and the military establishment. That said, attempting to bring about drastic organisational reform through a form of administrative fiat was bound to provoke an adverse reaction from the military establishment.
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11:26 PM
Moderate Islamist here
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