As long as Imran is there—whether in jail, exile, or even forced retirement—he will pose a threat to the Pakistan Army
This brief is part of the series, Pakistan: The Unravelling
The military establishment needs such a political force in Punjab to ensure that Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PMLN) doesn’t get a virtual walk-over as and when elections are held.Paradoxically, while ‘Minus-Every One’ can reduce the PTI into an empty shell, without Minus-One, the party will remain in play because the PTI is Imran Khan. Most of the big names like Shireen Mazari, Ali Zaidi, Maleeka Bokhari, and Fawad Chaudhry who have quit the party and politics are incapable of winning even a local council election on their own. Their entire political rise was because of Imran. On their own, they brought no votes. What will hurt Imran is the loss of the ‘electable’, the people who have their own constituencies and often switch loyalties to get the extra votes to win the electoral race. Efforts are already underway to corral some of the ‘electable’ deserters with constituencies to a new version of the PTI. Reports are coming in that Jehangir Tareen, a former right-hand man, financier, and fixer of Imran Khan, is casting the net to rope in the electables. The military establishment needs such a political force in Punjab to ensure that Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PMLN) doesn’t get a virtual walk-over as and when elections are held. Conventional political wisdom in Pakistan is that even after the desertion of electables, Imran’s rump PTI will still manage to get votes, but these will not be enough to win elections. The military cannot however afford to base their politics on conventional wisdom alone because it has gone horribly wrong in the past. No one ever expected Sheikh Mujibur Rehman to sweep East Pakistan in the 1970 elections and get a majority in Parliament. Similarly, everyone thought that Imran Khan would be punctured after losing the no-confidence vote in April 2022, but he bounced back and how. Therefore, even as the PTI is stripped of its membership, the military establishment will ensure that Imran cannot surprise them again. Simply put, the Pakistan Army and its junior partner (the ruling coalition) will not risk an election until and unless Imran is politically completely emasculated.
The military cannot however afford to base their politics on conventional wisdom alone because it has gone horribly wrong in the past.The Pakistan Army knows from experience that it is extremely difficult to transfer the vote-bank or support base of a popular/populist leader to either a faction or to pretenders. The support base can at best be whittled down. In the past, parties have survived worse crackdowns from the one PTI is facing. After the 1977 coup, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) lost a lot of its top leaders who couldn’t take the heat. But a large part of the support base stayed loyal. Similarly, after the 1999 coup, the PMLN was dismantled. Most top leaders and electables dumped Nawaz Sharif and made the proverbial King’s party—Pakistan Muslim League Quaid-e-Azam. But in neither of these two cases, the core support base or the popularity of the leaders suffered. This factor would certainly be weighing in the minds of the military establishment as it takes apart the PTI. One big problem that the Pakistan Army suffers from is that there is no one in the PTI who can replace Imran. The PTI is nothing if it is not the cult of Imran Khan. Any ideas that the Army might have of creating factions headed by some senior leaders like former Finance Minister Asad Umar or former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi or former defence minister Pervaiz Khattak is unlikely to work. These people can damage the PTI and draw down some of its support, they cannot replace Imran Khan because the cultists will never accept them. But this very same factor is also the biggest advantage that the Army has against PTI. Unlike PMLN and PPP that could survive the physical elimination, political suspension, judicial disqualification, and exile of its main leader, the PTI cannot survive without Imran Khan. Because PMLN, PPP, and virtually every other political party is a family enterprise and a dynasty, there was always someone who could succeed or inherit the mantle of the party. Not so in PTI. This means if Imran is removed from the scene, it will be the end of his cult and the challenge it represents to the dominance and primacy of the Pakistan Army. As long as Imran is there—whether in jail, exile, or even forced retirement—he will pose a threat to the Pakistan Army.
Any ideas that the Army might have of creating factions headed by some senior leaders like former Finance Minister Asad Umar or former foreign minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi or former defence minister Pervaiz Khattak is unlikely to work.That Imran Khan is today the most popular political figure in Pakistan is undeniable. If indeed his popularity was grievously and irretrievably damaged after the attacks on military installations and memorials, the Pakistan Army and the ruling coalition should have no problem going in for general elections. The fact they are not is proof that they know that they will get plastered in the elections. Even without the electables, there is a chance that Imran could pull off another Sheikh Mujbur Rehman or even a Zulfikar Ali Bhutto on the ruling combine. No matter how slim, this is not a chance anyone will want to take. This means that both Imran and PTI will have to go. The crackdown on PTI and Imran Khan is likely to intensify in the coming days and weeks. The party will be degraded, dismantled, and destroyed. Alongside, Imran will be put through the mill before the establishment goes for the kill. Only once this is achieved, elections will be held. Welcome to the new democracy, same as the old democracy of Pakistan.
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Sushant Sareen is Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation. His published works include: Balochistan: Forgotten War, Forsaken People (Monograph, 2017) Corridor Calculus: China-Pakistan Economic Corridor & China’s comprador ...
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