By Staff Reporter
PESHAWAR: Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has told its Khyber Pakhtunkhwa organisation that nothing changes at the top, confirming Junaid Akbar as provincial president and naming two officials to chair meetings in his absence, nearly two weeks after the federal government suspended the party’s elected administration in the province.
The notification, signed by party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and shared on X on Saturday, said the provincial organisation would continue under Akbar and that there would be no change to the party’s provincial cabinet or wider structure until further orders.
Senator Noorul Haq Qadri, the party’s senior vice-president in the province, will preside over cabinet meetings when Akbar cannot. Ali Asghar, the provincial general secretary, will take the chair in Qadri’s absence and has been authorised to convene and chair meetings of the party’s other tiers. The document also gives Asghar charge of administration, coordination and supervision across the organisation’s tiers and wings, to ensure that party policies, strategies and decisions are carried out.
Akbar, a National Assembly member from Malakand who took over the provincial presidency from Ali Amin Gandapur in January 2025 at Khan’s direction, was among the party figures taken into custody on 11 October. Local media reported that he was held with the chief minister Sohail Afridi, and the provincial assembly speaker, Babar Saleem Swati, at an undisclosed location. The federal government has said Afridi and some members of his cabinet were placed in preventive custody, and Minister of State for Interior Talal Chaudhry said Afridi had not been arrested. The notification does not say where Akbar is now.
The PTI’s provincial government fell on the same day that police arrested 59 party workers in Swabi and six others in Khyber district. The federal government declared an emergency and governor’s rule after talks with the opposition broke down, a week into a PTI long march on Islamabad that Afridi launched from Lakki Marwat on 4 October. The march was called to demand the release of Khan, who has been held in Adiala jail since 2023.
A joint sitting of parliament approved the emergency and governor’s rule for two months on 15 October. The prime minister’s coordinator for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa affairs, Ikhtiar Wali Khan, has said the measures could stay in force until the next elections. President Asif Ali Zardari approved them on the advice of the federal cabinet, with the government citing law and order.
Gohar has taken the fight to court. His petition at the Peshawar High Court asks for the elected provincial government to be restored. The court issued notices to the federal and provincial governments on Tuesday, and the hearing was reported to have been adjourned until 10 November. The petitions say the PTI won a two-thirds majority in the province in the 2024 general election and call the emergency unconstitutional and driven by malice. Opposition parties in the Tehreek Tahaffuz-e-Aeen-e-Pakistan alliance have ended negotiations with the centre.
Inside the party, the weeks since have been marked by public friction. On 21 October, Gandapur and the PTI secretary general, Salman Akram Raja, had traded criticism over alleged divisions, the provincial leadership and the handling of the party’s affairs. Raja warned of attempts by what he called “undemocratic decision-makers” to undermine internal consensus. Gandapur demanded that he substantiate his claims and apologise.
The dispute sharpened after the circulation of a purported audio recording in which Gandapur appeared to blame Raja’s “mismanagement and flawed planning” for the dismissal of the provincial government and the party’s present predicament.
Gandapur also rejected claims that provincial lawmakers were trying to settle the party’s leadership and the next chief minister without the approval of Khan and the party’s political committee. Raja maintained that Afridi remained the lawful chief minister and that Akbar was still provincial president, with Asghar acting in his absence, an arrangement that the new notification now puts in writing.
The two men have history. Gandapur stepped down as chief minister in October 2025 on Khan’s instruction, making way for Afridi, who took office that month. Earlier this month, Gandapur warned his successor to stop making allegations against him and threatened to expose him if they continued.
Gohar told reporters he had spoken to the leaders involved and urged them to stop issuing statements against one another. He said the party’s provincial lawmakers remained united and that Afridi was still the PTI’s choice for chief minister.
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