Imran Khan promised to change politics in Pakistan — but politics has changed the cricketer-turned-politician

Imran Khan (REUTERS)

April 9 saw full-fledged political drama in Pakistan which culminated in cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan being ousted out of power. On April 11, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz president Shehbaz Sharif was elected Pakistan’s 23rd Prime Minister. It would be premature to write off Khan, though this is a major setback for a leader who promised a new Pakistan.

Thirty years after lifting his country’s only World Cup in cricket, Imran Khan, the eternal enfant terrible became the first Prime Minister to get bowled out in vote of no-confidence in Pakistan National Assembly. In a political career spanning 36 years, he was the second Prime Minister in Pakistan’s 75 years’ chequered history to get power transferred onto him from an elected leader.

However, at the end, his term in office is seen less of a story of how a valiant sporting hero tried to change Pakistan politics than how unsettling constants of Pakistani politics and its inherent hard State mechanisations changed Khan, the politician in a hurry.

Tales are aplenty of how he used to motivate the team on and off the cricket pitch, and led from the front. His fabled exhortations to the team to fight like cornered tigers often found its reflections in his campaign speeches for a “Naya Pakistan”.

He said the right things those days — ending corruption, getting rid of dynastic politics, creating one million jobs — and coated everything in the rhetoric of nationalistic fervour.

He shed his image of a playboy cricketer to appear as a conservative Islamic leader who despised the despicable ways of the Wild West. And more importantly he perched himself on the right side of the Pakistan Army.

Campaign trails were akin to chest-thumping dressing-room speeches before a match, and Khan could never have found himself wanting on that front. But being in power is infinitely more difficult than playing on the pitch. On the cricket pitch, you fight one opponent team, some weather factors, and calculable variables of some umpiring decisions going against you. Though victories are results of teamwork, individual heroism of one or a couple of players could swing the pendulum in your favour on a given day.

Politics is the game of constant variables. All the more so in the case of an unpredictable polity such as Pakistan, where many fragile democratic institutions cohabit with the all-powerful Pakistan Army.

Khan was popular, but, unlike in India or in many other democratic country, popularity of an elected leader is a limiting factor in the febrile world of politics in Pakistan.

More than half of its Independent existence, Pakistan was ruled by military leaders. Though democracy is not alien to Pakistan, the army remains the fount that controls Pakistan’s foreign policy, and internal security. With the army on his side, Khan’s idealistic-sounding rhetoric didn’t ring so hollow in the beginning. As he faltered on governance, developed discord with the Army, and various actions lead to the people within his fold and in other political parties alienating him, his self-styled call for bringing change ran into many hurdles.

Pitted against too many issues, players, and variables, ushering in change requires a zest that doesn’t spring from the rhetoric and statements of intentions such as unleashing crusades against the corroding influence of western culture.

Despite all his lofty ideals, when in desperation, Khan was no different a politician. He tried to avoid facing a non-confidence motion. There are reports emerging now that Khan wanted to employ intimidating tactics against Opposition politicians.

That said, Khan still enjoys some support in Pakistan. Now the entire Opposition, including the PML (N) and the PPP, have joined hands against Khan. Being a good campaigner, Khan can still be around as a politician with considerable traction.

In this round, instead of changing politics in Pakistan, politics has changed Imran Khan. Will Khan have it in him to play till the last ball in the fast-muddying world of politics? The answer to that question will be known in the next innings of his political career, with fresh elections expected at later this year.