Imran Khan’s use of street power against Army boomerangs, may disqualify from elections

Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif has blamed Khan and his senior party leaders for directing the recent violence.

Imran Khan’s attempt to take on the powerful military establishment of Pakistan by using street power seems to have badly boomeranged.

The possibility of the former Prime Minister being disqualified from contesting the forthcoming parliament election is now looming large on Pakistan’s political firmament.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif said on Wednesday the government was considering banning his party-- Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-- in view of the coordinated and preplanned violent attacks carried out on military installations on May 9 following Imran Khan's arrest.

Asif said parliament would also be taken into confidence if the government arrived at a final decision on this.

Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif has blamed Khan and his senior party leaders for directing the recent violence.

The proposal that the Sharif government is mulling overcomes amid resignations of a number of senior leaders from Khan’s PTI over the past few days.

Though the May 9 violence directed against the Pakistani army establishment by the PTI workers seems to be the immediate provocation for the government to think about banning his party, Khan’s detractors had been toying with the idea for some months.

A history of acrimony

It is not clear yet whether the proposed ban will be aimed only at Imran Khan or his entire party.

But experts point out that irrespective of the important posts given to other leaders in the PTI, without Imran Khan the party is not worth much in political terms.

Some years back, Khan had collaborated with the army to use corruption charges against his political rival, Nawaz Sharif, to get him disqualified and out of the running for the parliament elections.

Khan came to power in the 2018 parliament election with the backing of the army and promised to build a “New Pakistan” that will care for all its citizens, particularly the poor and underprivileged.

But when he started taking decisions, independent of the army, especially those that were of interest to the top generals, the rift between the two sides began to widen.

Khan turned the situation worse when he targeted America, a close partner of the Pakistani army, for all the ills in the country and angered the military establishment further.

His subsequent ouster from parliament after he lost a trust vote was blamed on a combined effort by the United States, the Pakistan army and his political detractors.

Khan gets a long rope 

Attempts to arrest Khan on some corruption charges were foiled earlier when his supporters threw a ring of protection against his residence and prevented security forces from entering the premises.

The army did not want to escalate the tension and gave Khan a long rope to carry out his political activities by organising massive rallies against the government in different cities for its failure to check rising inflation.

But when the former prime minister got carried away with the large turnouts at his rallies and began to attack the army and its spy wing, the Inter-Services- Intelligence (ISI), and held them responsible for the assassination attempt on him, the army decided to act.

When he was arrested by the Pakistani Rangers early this month and there was large-scale violence in different cities by his supporters and attacks on army installations, the generals decided to come down heavily on him and other senior leaders of the PTI and his supporters.

“A protégé-turned-rebel has to be culled. The May 9 mayhem provided the establishment (the army) a justification to strike back with a severity not witnessed in recent times,” observed commentator Zahid Hussain.

Brinkmanship 

Experts argue that perhaps Khan thought that a show of street power could force the army to step back.

But that brinkmanship boomeranged.

The widespread violence targeting the army installations and the vandalization of memorials of martyred soldiers provoked a strong reaction, particularly in Punjab, the battleground of the recent months.

Observers think that the anti-establishment mood that Khan had capitalised on all these months now seemed to have changed.

The changed situation has now put the PTI on the defensive as had been evident from a string of resignations of its senior leaders and regular condemnation of the violence against the army by Khan and his party comrades.

Parliamentary polls 

If Imran Khan is now taken out of the political situation by an official ban on him for the recent violence or the pending corruption charges, it will make it easier for other leaders to contest the October parliamentary elections.

The two Provincial Assembly elections in Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) that were due to be held in May could also be held together with the parliamentary elections.

The Pakistan Muslim League--led by the Sharifs and the Pakistan People’s Party controlled by the Bhutto-Zardaris -- will definitely be agreeable to such a political landscape.

But Imran Khan perhaps will continue to be the most popular leader in the country despite his current setback.

Therefore, an election from which he has been taken out by the government-army combination may turn out to be a plank for the former prime minister to return to the political centre stage.

Pakistan may then have to deal with a much stronger Imran Khan.