A year in chaos

Today marks one year since PTI founding chairman and former prime minister Imran Khan was arrested after a trial court in Islamabad found him guilty of the “offence of corrupt practices” in the Toshakhana case. Just days before the February 8 polls, he was handed one sentence after another in the cipher, Toshakhana and iddat cases as well. The way these sentences were handed out just before the general elections led to many predicting that these sentences would be thrown out by the courts later because of the way these trials were conducted. And this is exactly what has happened in recent months after the polls. However, Imran Khan remains behind bars since each time he gets bail, a new case turns up.

It has become quite obvious that Imran Khan’s luck has turned out to be different to what many other politicians have experienced in similar circumstances. And this is not for want of trying by the state. In fact, many had predicted that due to his convictions before the polls, PTI supporters would be discouraged to vote because a decision had already been made to keep him out of the system. However,. PTI voters went out in droves and exercised their right to vote, making the PTI the single largest party in the National Assembly despite the fact that the party did not contest on a single electoral symbol. While the PTI did not form a government in the centre, it did win a comfortable majority in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The election results definitely gave a boost to Imran, an added advantage being a more independent higher judiciary this time.

Why then is he incarcerated when his popularity is not dissipating? Some say the government believes keeping Imran Khan behind bars can lead to stability – though one wonders at their definition of stability. Is what we have right now a stable system?Meanwhile, talks about talks have been in the air for a few days now – the larger question being: who is talking to whom? And why are politicians so reluctant to talk to each other without the hand-holding? If this cycle is not broken, our voters will always be disenfranchised. In an ideal world, a popular leader would focus his/her all on tweaking the power lopsidedness in the country and investing everything in civilian supremacy. Pakistan, sadly, is far from an ideal.