Imran’s playbook

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is not happy with PTI Chairman Imran Khan. In a case of enough-is-enough, on Thursday the prime minister lashed out at Imran by calling him anti-state, an enemy of Pakistan and a hypocrite, saying that Imran and his PTI had wanted the country to default. On his part, Imran seems to be wearing his ‘dangerous’ tag as a badge of honour, going so far as to calling himself even more ‘dangerous’ than before. While Imran Khan’s populist actions may be getting more and more desperate over time, to the extent of even attempts at sabotaging the economy, perhaps PM Shehbaz Sharif could set a precedent in our politics by not handing out certificates of patriotism or treason. That said, jeopardizing the IMF programme when the country is reeling from rising inflation and devastating floods that have resulted in losses of billions of dollars and livelihoods of over 33 million people shows a special kind of narcissism that perhaps only Imran Khan can get away with.

It has by now become quite obvious that ‘getting away with it [all]’ is something the PTI and its leader seem to take for granted. And with some justification it would seem. The ready use of the populist’s playbook has rarely been perfected to such an art form as the former prime minister has honed it into. On his Friday jalsa in Gujrat, Imran once again targeted the government using the IMF programme as his weapon of choice: calling PM Sharif a ‘boot-polisher’, saying the PTI too had joined the IMF programme but prices hadn’t increased this direly. As his supporters lap up this rhetoric, it seems this time the IMF is not having any of it, the Fund in its recent country report for Pakistan pointing out the flawed policies pursued during the PTI’s time in government. Not to be left behind, an assortment of PTI leaders has also been resorting increasingly to belligerent comments, sometimes targeting journalists, sometimes the judiciary. The PTI is on the face of it sticking to its insistence on early elections but it may just be that the party has read the writing on the wall: early elections are now a very distant possibility. What we are witnessing right now is the PTI jumpstarting its election campaign even if the elections are a year away. With little else to offer, there isn’t much more the party can talk about since Imran has had little to say on why he was not able to deliver in almost four years of his tenure. He has not given an economic vision; decrying the IMF loan is no plan. In fact, his ‘dangerous’ avatar seems to only extend to either a threatening tone when he feels cornered or caricaturing his political opponents at jalsas.

Pakistan’s biggest problems when democracy came back in 2008 were terrorism, economy and the energy crisis. By the end of 2017-18, Pakistan had crushed terrorism, resolved the energy crisis and controlled its fiscal deficit. It needed to manage its current account deficit, which could have been resolved given time. Pakistan would still have needed an IMF plan but at least the country would have been in a better negotiating position. Now when the entire world is dealing with rising inflation, a country like Pakistan’s problems have quadrupled. At this time of a national crisis, we need political unity more than ever. Instead, our political class is busy fighting its own battles.