What awaits IK in parliamentary politics?
Imran Khan has returned to the National Assembly, hopefully somewhat wiser. During the last two years he has resorted to agitation, making appeals to the Election Commission and the SC in an unrealistic pursuit of justice in accordance with his wishes. The months long Islamabad sit-in failed because the umpire failed to raise the finger and the entire opposition came to the rescue of the PM in order to support the system. The PTI resigned from the NA and the Punjab and Sindh Assemblies. As this failed to create the desired impact the party returned to the legislatures after seven months. Imran Khan then challenged the 2013 elections before a judicial commission formed on PTI’s own request. The commission’s findings turned out to be against his expectations. In early October of this year Imran Khan again boycotted the NA and launched a march on Islamabad vowing not to come back till the removal of the PML-N government which he expected to happen by the month’s end.
Imran Khan has now lost hope in the judiciary and army. He maintains that after taking over every other institution, Sharif is now eyeing the Supreme Court and the army. Meanwhile, the PTI supporters are fed up with unproductive rallies and sit-ins. The representation of Punjab at the recent Islamabad rally was much below PTI’s expectations. This constitutes another factor behind the decision to return to Parliament. Imran Khan being a mercurial leader, it makes it all the more difficult to predict that henceforth he would confine himself to parliamentary politics while shunning agitation.
Parliamentary politics requires a willingness to join hands with other parties who may not entirely agree with one. It requires an ability to use the parliamentary debates to gather public support and the question time to expose the government’s shortcomings. A parliamentarian is expected to possess the knack to expose the opponents without sounding crass. Above all it requires patience. It remains to be seen if Imran Khan has the capacity to learn all this while simultaneously restraining PTI’s dotcom brigade from insulting those who differ.
