Gradually the PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) government is losing its grip on power, as the political opposition not only has pushed it on to the back foot but has also weakened the military establishment’s control of the power chessboard. On Sunday, the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), and alliance of opposition parties, held its third massive public gathering, this time in Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province.
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This speech of Sharif’s has raised the temperature of the politics of Pakistan and now it is the government of Imran Khan, General Bajwa and General Faiz that is feeling the heat. A defiant Sharif ready to lock horns with the current leadership of the establishment was the last thing Khan would have wanted, as his survival is dependent on Bajwa and Faiz.
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Khan may be vulnerable, but the fate of his predecessors doesn’t doom him. In fact, he stands a strong chance of becoming the first Pakistani premier to complete a full term—thanks to the limitations of the opposition, some personal and policy success stories, and above all a military that has his back.
Just because Imran is flailing around doesn’t automatically have to mean that a better frontman can never be unearthed. It could just be a question of more skilfully looking in the right place at the right time. A regime frontman with the skills of a technocrat, the savvy of a traditional politician and the sleight of hand of a populist. See the problem there? In Pakistan? You may as well be looking for a unicorn snuggling up to leprechaun at the end of a rainbow.
After a hard-partying life as a cricket star and sex symbol, Pakistan’s prime minister has transformed himself from revered sportsman into international statesman. Now, as he seeks to navigate the crisis over Kashmir, Khan remains torn between his years as an Oxford-educated playboy and his growing role as a critic of Western decadence.
Imran probably first came to the attention of the non-cricket-playing world in May 2005 as a result of a Newsweek article claiming that U.S. interrogators had desecrated copies of the Koran while questioning prisoners at Guantanamo Bay… Imran lost little time in calling a press conference in Islamabad, in which, flourishing a copy of the magazine, he called the incident “a disgrace” and “an insult to Muslims,” who were now “themselves under attack from the West.” At least seventeen people were killed and up to six hundred injured when demonstrators then took to the streets of Pakistan to shout anti-U.S. slogans and burn the American flag. It took five days for the disturbances to be brought under control.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan is fond of using sporting clichés to explain complicated political dilemmas. “Bowling out the opposition” and forcing the “Umpire’s finger” are both regulars from his public speaking playbook. But as problems mount for Pakistan’s civilian leader, it’s getting harder to explain away reality with handy cricket metaphors. Cricket, after all, cannot be played in the rain—and Khan’s ship of state is about to run into some pretty bad weather.
The general sense is that with Modi at the helm of affairs, war and conflict will mark the tone of relations between the two countries. However, this would be beneficial for Pakistan’s nationalist project that gets strengthened with every news of mob lynching of Muslims and other minorities, from India. This is not to argue that the state of minorities in Pakistan is any better: But New Delhi no longer represents a secular ideal. For Islamabad, a non-secular India is easier to contest.
Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan said he thinks there may be a better chance of peace talks with India if Prime Minister Narendra Modi wins the 2019 Lok Sabha polls due to begin on Thursday. Khan said that if the next Indian government were led by the opposition Congress party, it might be too scared to seek a settlement with Pakistan over Kashmir, fearing a backlash from the right.
These two men hold the key to whether India and Pakistan edge closer to an all out war. One — Narendra Modi — is a former tea seller turned politician who leads one of the world’s fastest growing economies: India. The other — Imran Khan — is a cricketing legend and leader of Pakistan, a country on the brink of financial and economic meltdown.
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