THERE is a particular exhaustion that comes with defending Maryam Nawaz. Not because she doesn’t deserve defending — she does, frequently, from attacks that are nakedly misogynistic, cruel in ways her male counterparts simply do not experience. I have written about this before. The ‘nani’ taunts, the speculation about her appearance, the AI-generated deepfake images that now circulate on social media with depressing regularity — these are not political critique. They are attempts to destroy a woman by degrading her physical appearance. They are designed not to hold power to account but to remind women everywhere what awaits them if they dare to reach for it. And yet. Here we are again.

Maryam Nawaz, chief minister of Pakistan’s most populous province, a province where children go to school under a toxic smog she has yet to meaningfully address, where hospitals are underfunded and trust in the state is at historic lows — this same CM has reportedly approved the purchase of a dedicated government plane. In a country that went to the IMF with a begging bowl not long ago. In a country where the rupee has lost half its value in two years. In a country where the median monthly income would not cover the catering bill on said aircraft. This is not misogyny. This is math.

The conflation of the two — legitimate policy criticism and gender-based attacks — has become one of the most convenient shields in modern politics, and not just in Pakistan.

When Jacinda Ardern led New Zealand, she faced vile attacks: her parenting questioned, her appearance mocked, her authority undermined in ways that had nothing to do with policy. It was right to call that out. But when critics questioned her government’s handling of the cost of living crisis, that was not misogyny. That was democracy. Ardern herself understood the distinction. She never weaponised her gender to deflect accountability.

The test is not who is speaking but what they are saying.

Sheikh Hasina led Bangladesh for 15 years, during which she faced attacks on her authority that were soaked in misogyny — her relationship with her father’s legacy weaponised against her, her legitimacy as a woman in power. It was right to call that out. But Hasina’s government also oversaw enforced disappearances, the systematic dismantling of democratic institutions and ultimately became so divorced from the people it claimed to serve that students brought it down with their bare hands last year.

The women who protest against women leaders are not misogynists. They are citizens. Both things — the gendered attacks on a person and the legitimate fury at their governance — can be true at the same time. The test is not who is speaking. The test is what they are saying.

When male politicians mock Maryam’s appearance, that is misogyny. When a journalist asks why the Punjab CM needs a private aircraft while her province runs a deficit, that is journalism. The problem in Pakistan — and this is the rot I keep returning to — is that we have so thoroughly contaminated political discourse that we can no longer tell the difference. The misogynists have polluted the well so completely that legitimate critics now find themselves drinking from it too, guilt by association.

Social media has made this immeasurably worse. The recent deepfake images circulating of Maryam on a plane are part of a global epidemic. Similar images have been created of Giorgia Meloni in Italy, of female MPs across the UK parliament, of former Taiwanese president Tsai Ing-wen. A 2023 study found that 96 per cent of deepfake videos online are non-consensual pornography, and the overwhelming majority of targets are women in public life. The intent is unambiguous: make the cost of being a wo­­man in power so un­­be­arable, so humiliating, so dangerous, that fe­­wer women attempt it. In that context, def­en­ding women leaders from gendered attacks is not optional. It is urgent.

But — and I risk making some of you mad, others glad — that defence cannot become a blank cheque. Maryam Nawaz is not above scrutiny because she is a woman. She is subject to scrutiny because she is CM. The plane is a scandal not because of who bought it but because of what it represents: a ruling class so insulated from consequence, so soaked in entitlement, so convinced that power exists to be enjoyed rather than exercised in service of the public, that the optics of a private jet in an IMF-dependent country did not give anyone in that government a moment’s pause. The misogynists want Maryam gone because she is a woman. The rest of us want better because she is in power.

These are not the same thing. And until we learn to hold both thoughts at once — to condemn the deepfakes and demand accountability — we will keep having this exhausting, circular argument while Punjab chokes and the plane sits on the tarmac, gleaming.

The writer is a former journalism instructor.

X: @LedeingLady

Published in Dawn, March 1st, 2026