Always looking for the ‘right’ ally
Jamaat-e-Islami considers itself the party of the Saliheen, or the virtuous, and looks down with disdain on common mortals. Being a political party it is also keen to rule the country. Being a cadre party with an exclusivist agenda it knows it can never reach the corridors of power on its own. JI therefore seeks the support of major parties that it otherwise looks at with disdain. Some of the alliances it made in the past, like the one with Zia-ul-Haq, made the people realise to what depths the self-styled purists can fall. The Jamaat later joined the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) hammered together by the ISI and one of its top leaders and along with two associates were beneficiaries of the munificence of the spy agency. While Musharraf disallowed PPP and PML-N from holding public meetings prior to the 2002 elections, religious parties that included JI were given a free hand to strike roots and get elected from the present KP, where it is a part of the cabinet courtesy the alliance with the PTI.
Siraj-ul-Haq opted for the role of a negotiator between the PML-N government and Imran Khan to keep good relations with both, thus keeping his options in the next elections open. Being the party of the virtuous it has always had a low view of those it was piggybacking. While any ally of the PTI in KP, the party hesitated to attend the sit-in as it was unwilling to be seen a partner in the proceedings that a potential ally like Fazlur Rehman might call un-Islamic.
That Imran Khan and Nawaz Sharif are two sides of the same coin is how the JI looks at the two. Being a self-righteous religious party one can understand the position. The party thinks it is good to keep contact with both. Depending upon which side offers a larger share, JI can describe it as the lesser evil and thus justify entering into coalition with it.
