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Sunday, October 6, 2024

Imran Khan: Still has some vision to prove us wrong?

M. Q. Yaaser |

Millions including Hassan Nisar and myself are shocked to know that the hero (Imran Khan) whom we have idealized for more than two decades while he has been doing popular politics has proved himself visionless during the first six months of his premiership of the poor nation. While ‘electable’ were joining PTI (Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf ) in large numbers before July 25th, 2018 elections last year, we were told by the ‘wise’ minds of the PTI that this actually did not matter; one always needs to form the government with the support of these electables.

What really matters is the vision of the leadership that is followed by the so-called ‘electable’ while the visionary leader is in power. We believed this (as we had no other option) as we were used to believing in those days whatever was uttered by Imran Khan and his hawkish followers. Our first shock came when for the first hundred days PTI ministers disappeared.

A large majority of the nation wants Imran Khan to succeed because if he fails one only gets frightened with the idea of thinking what will be next.

They came on the surface with a strange advertisement in the newspapers which said: “we were busy”. They meant that they were busy in making policies. I still wonder that what policies Zubaida Jalal and Fehmida Mirza would have made during these first 100 days. If made, they are still unknown to the general public. Another disappointing event was Shahbaz Sharif’s chairmanship of PAC (Public Accounts Committee); a committee that “Okays” all the financial mishandlings of the previous government.

This was the compromise that made the corrupt opposition think that when put under pressure Imran Khan will agree to do anything that will save his government. That is the classical mistake that all the former prime ministers have been making for decades. They start compromising and one day they become so weak and infamous in the eyes of the public that even when they are removed by the military dictators there is no one for them to ‘lay under the tanks’ as it happened in Turkey; hoping against hope that Imran Khan must have learned his lesson till now.

Read more: What Imran Khan didn’t know & why? – Mohammad Zubair

Donald J. Trump has proved himself better than Imran Khan in this regard. He has made the American government shutdown for the longest time in American history but still is demanding that Democrats must support him in getting 5 billion $ to build a wall along Marxian border. No other government in the history of Pakistan has been blessed what PTI government is blessed of. The military and the judiciary are standing behind the prime minister in a hope that he is capable of fixing the things.

This was the compromise that made the corrupt opposition think that when put under pressure Imran Khan will agree to do anything that will save his government.

This Shahbaz Sharif episode must have been a surprise to them also. Imran Khan must understand that he became prime minister by doing popular politics not that of famous ‘reconciliation’ politics of Asif Ali Zardari. If he has become prime minister from nowhere now what is stopping him in delivering. It should not matter that the assembly doesn’t work. It was not working when Imran Khan was sitting on container outside that parliament for more than 3 months. He hardly went to the parliament from 2013-2018. But still, parliament went on.

Read more: Imran Khan: The only hope for Pakistan?

Even this is not working now it must not worry him and he must not fall in the trap of Asad Qaisar, who only to run the parliament made Shehbaz Sharif chairman PAC. Asad Qaisar must have his own capacity to run the parliament. One wonders if Imran Khan kept listening to the doves of PTI, he soon will become Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto of 70s and one can’t see even one Mubasher Hussain in this current cabinet who resigned from Bhutto cabinet just to give a wakeup call to Bhutto that he was on wrong track. Most of the current cabinet will be taking oath under the next prime minister while Imran Khan will be lecturing on democracy on the streets of London.

So this is the high time for Imran Khan to deliver. Whatever he wants to implement, if the constitution hinders it, he must do it through a presidential ordinance. He must not worry what PPP will say on this. Presidential ordnance is permitted in the law and if PPP and PMLN were so sincere to democracy they must have removed it and articles 62/63 from the constitution while they were in power. They only passed the 18th amendment that allowed them to divide the budget among themselves during power.

The military and the judiciary are standing behind the prime minister in a hope that he is capable of fixing the things.

A large majority of the nation wants Imran Khan to succeed because if he fails one only gets frightened with the idea of thinking what will be next. We still hope that Imran Khan has some vision. You must not be an extra visionary to fix the health, education issues, and bring Madrissa reforms in this country. Madrissa education must be mainstreamed as soon as possible.

Read more: Can PM Imran Khan de-politicize bureaucracy?

But even Imran Khan fails in doing these simple things during his tenure, still being blessed by the backing of judiciary and Military then we must accept it as a reality considering that all political careers have ended in failures. Adding to that we can satisfy ourselves more telling ourselves that a cricketer who was in charge of only 11 persons in a cricket ground which had very less to do with the word ‘vision’, had no vision and was never able to run a country of 220 million and this was us who been disappointed by others thought him to be our saviour.

M. Q. Yaaser holds a Master’s degree in Political Science and one in Sociology, He has an interest in international and domestic politics. He writes to keep a record of his own thoughts. The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Global Village Space’s editorial policy.