While Imran Khan says he will run in all nine constituencies up for by-polls on September 25, his lawyers are pleading the court to stop the by-polls. Can he have it both ways?
By Ahmer Kureishi
Former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s idea of contesting by-polls from all nine constituencies that fell vacant after the National Assembly Speaker accepted resignations of lawmakers from his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has galvanised his following.
Here we have a brave leader ready to take on the world all by himself. Cheers! Meanwhile, his legal team is pushing for a stay on the by-polls in Islamabad High Court.
If you are wondering what happened to the old saying, you can’t have your cake and eat it too? Hang on!
The main case of Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in the IHC is immediate acceptance of the resignations of all its members of National Assembly (MNAs) in one go. But the party has told the same MNAs not to verify their resignations to the Speaker National Assembly.
When a judge in another case held quitting the National Assembly en masse against PTI, Khan’s lawyer promptly said the resignations were part of a political strategy – implying it was somehow not the same thing as quitting the assembly.
Meanwhile, the PTI MNAs continue to draw their salaries and occupy their Parliament Lodges luxury suites. Not only that, Khan’s former cabinet ministers are staying put in their Ministers’ Enclave residences, and continue to use their official vehicles.
If you are unable to pin down the precise position Khan is taking in this matter, you are right. He may have been a speed merchant in cricket, but in politics, Khan is (also) a master of spin, who has this unheard of knack of taking every possible position and no position at all in any given matter at any given time.
In other words, if you are Imran Khan, you can eat your cake, send it to neighbours, put it in the fridge, plaster it on your detractors’ faces, return it to the bakery, and have it too.
Consider the issue of corruption. Khan rode to power on an anticorruption platform. When it became apparent some of his ministers were minting money at the public expense, his diehard followers argued Khan himself was above reproach because while some of his ministers were corrupt, his own honesty was unquestionable.
Consider the matter of money laundering. Khan and his cohorts have proclaimed their opposition to money laundering from the rooftops throughout his sojourn in power. The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) ruling in the so-called prohibited funding case, however, proves beyond doubt that Khan and his cronies had amassed funding from prohibited sources and laundered it to hide its origin.
You’d expect Khan to be miffed. You’d expect his followers’ enthusiasm to dampen, their morale to plummet. You’d be wrong. The new party line is, “What if he laundered money? He was bringing it back to Pakistan, not siphoning it off to foreign bank accounts!”
“But he signed off on those falsified accounts statements, which proves he is dishonest!” you exclaim. “Not so fast”, they retort. “He’s a hero for bringing all that money to Pakistan!”
Small wonder Khan’s opposition is flailing in the face of the onslaught of his cohorts. Small wonder nobody dares call him out on anything while they can help it. Up until now, Maryam Nawaz Sharif has been the only political personality prepared (and probably equipped) to challenge Khan. But she was tested sourly in last month’s Punjab by-polls – and found wanting.
The upshot was that Khan took 14 out of 20 contested constituencies in a province long believed to be the bastion of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) with the party in power both at the province and the centre.
This allowed him to oust PML-N’s chief minister from Pakistan’s most populous province, reducing the shaky hold of Pakistan Democratic Front (PDM) to Islamabad.
It works to Khan’s advantage that despite all these setbacks, the great lion in London has chosen to stay on in London – even with his younger brother in the hot seat in Pakistan.
In fact, Nawaz Sharif’s detractors are already attacking him for being afraid of another sojourn in Adiala. They are insinuating that the proud exponent of ‘vote ko izzat do’ is waiting on a signal from the military, and that the military is not prepared to extend the assurances he needs.
If continued to allow, this hostile chatter could sour the political mood in the country and hurt the morale of Sharif’s diehard followers. The catch right now is that without Nawaz Sharif returning, the upcoming by-polls may be similarly favour Khan and remain unfavourable to PML-N.
There is the small matter that while the Constitution does not bar anyone from contesting any number of constituencies, nobody keeps more than one seat. This clearly means Khan, who is already an MNA, will have to vacate any seats he manages to win – forcing further by-polls and reducing the whole process to a joke.
But who can dissuade Khan from taking the course of action he deems fit for his purposes? And who knows what those purposes are? He is likely to kick off his electoral campaign at a public meeting at Islamabad’s Parade Ground the day before the Independence Day.
The word for now, therefore, is that the tiger is coming. Let us see if the lions decide to call in the alpha or take on him on their own, risking annihilation.
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