CHITRAL: Former prime minister and head of the country’s largest political party, Imran Khan is a larger than life figure in Pakistan’s murky politics. His personal charisma along with populist slogans phrased for his party, have made him into an icon of Pakistan’s contemporary political canvass. Imran Khan’s main support segment is derived from the youth of Pakistan, who thoroughly frustrated with erstwhile corrupt and inefficient politicians readily accepted him as a messiah and now form his major support base.
Imran Khan got a chance to see his party hurled into power in the KP province in 2013 and himself became prime minister after the 2018 elections until voted out by the National Assembly in 2021. In other words Imran Khan got ten years to rule the KP province with 2/3 majority and over three years as Prime minister of the country.
If we look at the facts objectively, Imran Khan squarely failed to deliver on his promises in the ten year opportunity he got to rule over the KP province and three years as PM. The three main areas where his failures glare are:
Firstly, He failed to bring about any kind of accountability which was his biggest promise and which was the main bait that drew the youth towards him. In fact during his rule, corruption at all levels increased and fear of accountability greatly diminished.
Second, He failed to set up a viable local government system which was his second biggest promise, rather in fact he corrupted the face of even Musharraf’s LG system, throwing the system at the mercy of beaurocracy, instead of trusting the people.
Third, He failed to bring about promised austerity either in his own person or anywhere in the government, let alone ask the armed forces to do so. Going to office daily in a helicopter in a debt ridden country is to mention the glaring obvious.
Now again the tide is in favor of Imran Khan to gain power whenever elections are held, as his opponents are the same condemned people. He has bigger challenges this time as his supporters have made even bigger sacrifices and want potent results, not speeches, regrets and apologies like before. However if past performance is any indicator of future prospects, can it be expected that he will come up to the expectations of his supporters? This is the million dollar question of the moment. .. CN report, 28 Apr 2023
One thought on “Will Imran Khan be able to oblige his supporters if returned to power?”
Imran Khan’s strength lies in the pathetically weak past performance of his opponents. Otherwise as far as his own performance while in power goes, he is ‘more of the same’