A motley crew, to say the least
In order to achieve the ambitious target of fielding 1,000 candidates in the next general elections, Imran Khan is collecting all sorts of politicians that he considers electable. The lot he has collected so far is a motley crowd of highly educated professionals including doctors and lawyers as well as tribal maliks, clan figures, spiritual healers, big landlords, former bureaucrats and retired military and intelligence personnel.
Some of these are widely known turncoats who have changed loyalties several times in their political career with the sole aim of being a part of the government. They now maintain that to err is human and that after having lost the way again and again, as any mortal could, they have finally reached the destination that they had all along been dreaming about, the PTI.
The integrity of the new entrants poses no problem to Mr Clean. Like Zardari, Gilani, Nawaz Sharif, Ch Shujaat et al, they have declared their meagre assets several times. The car they drive is a gift from a friend in Dubai and the palatial house they occupy belongs to their wife. Delving into the accounts, declared or those secretly stacked in foreign banks, is no ordinary task. Imran Khan cannot hire hundreds of income tax specialists going through the data collected by scores of Sherlock Holmes in the short period before the next elections. It is after all Imran Khan who has to finally determine whether the assets declared by a politician have been reported honestly.
The colourful lot Imran is bringing together is in a way typical of the country where sedan cars run alongside tractor trolleys, minibuses running on combustible gas, rickshaws, bicycles and donkey carts, all on the same road. This explains the high accident rate in Pakistan.
Every variety of the new entrants has its peculiar ideas and demands. These are often diametrically opposed to one another. This explains why Imran remains an enigma to many. Like a good pir, he is required to give a lollipop to every devotee. To the modernised youth looking for change, “the real ray of hope” lies with Imran who they think is a leader who will wipe out the forces of the status quo. He promises them a movement akin to a tsunami that would demolish and wash away the structures of the past to the open sea. He tells them his party would “bring a true revolution in the country in a bid to eliminate the corrupt and provide justice to everybody.”
To take the youth along, he has changed the style of his public meetings. He is the first leader to introduce bands on the stage, popular among the youth particularly from upscale English medium schools. During his one hour long well choreographed performance at Minar-e-Pakistan, half the time was consumed by music which changed as he hopped from subject to subject.
Imran has, however, to cater to an altogether different type of clients also. A day before, a group of leaders of belonging to Jamaat-e-Islami and Jamaat-ud-Daawa was to meet him, the PTI leader announced he was in fact working for Khilafat-e-Rashida. Liaquat Baloch told the media after the meeting that they had invited Imran to participate in the Defence Council of Pakistan moot organised by these parties on December 18th. As Imran traverses the thorny path that leads to the glorious Khilafat, he hopes the rigours would be lightened in the company of Shireen Mazari, Maleeha Lodhi, Marvi Memon, Maria B, Neelum Shah, Shafqat Mahmud and Ibrarul Haq who have either joined him or have declared their whole hearted support for the PTI.
With every new entrant, Imran has to extend the list of his objectives. To minorities, he has promised “peace and harmony.” Perhaps he knows that under the Sharia law that operates in a Khilafat, the minorities have to be declared zimmies and are required to pay jizya, a special tax levied on non-Muslims.
Imran stands for democracy. He complains that corrupt politicians sometime get elected. However, like every good democrat he is confident that the problem would be remedied if the elections are held on time for a few decades.
Imran also has an eye on the voters of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, PATA and FATA where remnants of tribalism continue to exert themselves. He is, therefore, all praise for the jirga system and the instant and cheap justice it provides. It remains unclear if Imran supports a special status for PATA and FATA with an alternate judicial system for the region or is for the integration of the tribal belt with the rest of the country as demanded by the more enlightened people in tribal areas. Perhaps, he his waiting to see which stand will fetch him more voters.
A party of the type with contradictory pulls and pressures can work well as a demolition squad. But to able to run the country from Islamabad, the party needs to have a single voice rather than be seen as the Tower of Babel. One hopes to see some sort of an agreed document on December 25 that can keep together all the heterogeneous element that seem to have been yoked together by force.
The writer is a former academic and a political analyst.
Imran should learn from the experience of Mian Azhar in Musharraf period . This is a naive premise that leader can control his corrupt followers. It can be otherwise too !
As long as it betst the job done
correction: "Perhaps, he is & not his waiting to see"
Maleeha Lodhi in PTI, I like the sound of that. Any motley crew run under the leadership of Imran Khan on any given day will perform a dozen times better than the current & past PPP PML-N governments.
My friend, I also liked IK but I don't want to support these corrupt people coming in PTI. These people if not have not done financial corruption are morally corrupt. Look at the new appointment of PTI information secretary. Please read his articles against IK. he was with PPP in 1990's. Joined Mushraf in his initial govt. Left him after Mushraf brought others forward. He was praising Shariff's up till few months ago. Accepting corrupy/turncoats in the name of electability is corruption itself. IK must have confindence in himself. When Bhutto won, he did not have any electables. Unfortunately he later went back to these sort of people.
The one thing he knows how to do is handle a motley crew. either way in comparison to the rest IK remains an angel. as far as his team goes i suppose that is the problem in our form of government. I as a voter cannot vote directly for IK as president/ PM. I must vote for the candidate in my constituency and hope enough people do the same elsewhere to get the magic number of legislators in place.
we dont have any options left except we have already given 2o years to the previous govts what the hell they have given us nothing except poverty and miseries especially mushraff and pml ppp and other allies so why not new one
prof manazar jhelum
We don't know if Imran is right in all his expedients for being hollow and lacking clear policy and programs for the 170 million people of pak. What i want to say is: be assured that the solution is less dangerous than disease itself!
Imran khan fought two elections before and his party gained only one seat( imran khan himself) Now this time he can not take the same risk, he has to bring in electable candidates in order to form a government.Moreover most of the people joining PTI are good people and not involved in any known corruption cases .People who had been in government in the past and are joining PTI does not mean they are corrupt.
I have one issue with analyst who have IK under the microscope. This is Pakistan, a country aspiring to be a democratic country ( i don't believe it is yet). So you cannot be looking at presidential or prime minister candidate as it is looked at in U.K or U.S. Pakistan has its unique probs or requirements that we haven't even started to deal with yet. Every reasonable person openly or secretly wishes someone like IK to take the helm of the government but they also start pointing at the problems and issues which might occur in distant future. This is not a bad thing in fact exactly the thing we idealy should be doing but realistically speaking just a honest and brave leader is the start that would be enough to get us going. so let us all do what we can to initiate this impending start rather than confusing ourselves with political gibberish.
P.S I liked the column though.
here comes the "too hot for revolution" Toru brigade!!
To proponent of Khilafat E Rashida:
Arooj e dar say dekhain ya pas e divar e zidan say
Tujay ruswa sar e bazaar e alam ham bhi dekhain ghay
Pakistan is multi schoolf thoughts country and you need representation of every social thought, right, left, religious,literate, bradari, etc.
"Horses for courses" in election. Policy makers are quite small group not every MNA or MPA, they just need to follow.
I repeat Mr AMJAD CHEEMA'S comments
Confusion grips PTI
http://blogs.thenews.com.pk/blogs/2011/12/18/1217…
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