Islamabad, Pakistan: A campaign launched by PTI in social as well as mainstream media claims that confidence-building measures (CBMs) are operational between military leadership and former prime minister Imran Khan. PTI-friendly political analysts, writers, and YouTubers want to tell us that ‘rapprochement between Khan and the military has successfully achieved and release of Bushra Bibi, the third wife of Khan and former First Lady was a result of CBMs. According to them, the only issue that needs to be fixed is that Khan wants to stay in Pakistan after his release from jail while the establishment wants to send him abroad. It is also claimed that certain ‘friendly’ countries played a pivotal role in such arrangements. As always the story is interesting but as always it has nothing to do with realities.
An independent and unbiased analysis of this latest ‘storytelling’ indicates that such stories are the need of the day for PTI which is swiftly collapsing as a house of cards due to massive divisions within the ranks of party and PTI to some extent has already fallen into chaos and confusion. Groups have formed somewhere in the party that are doing their politics and in addition to these groups, now the wife of the founder PTI, Bushra Bibi, has become active in politics to push back engross of sisters of Imran Khan. After the meeting called by Bushra Bibi in Peshawar yesterday, it has now been proven that Bushra Bibi is going to completely take over the party, due to which other senior leaders of PTI and sisters of Khan are worried, but they are keeping quiet.
Interestingly, Bushra Bibi did not invite senior leadership of PTI to the Peshawar meeting, while the political instructions given in this meeting seemed to be less orders and more threats to PTI leadership. Bushra Bibi made it clear to all the members of the National and Provincial Assembly that each member of the National Assembly should bring 10 thousand people for the final call of protest (November 24, 224) and each member of the Provincial Assembly should bring five thousand people for protest and whoever fails to bring this number will be expelled from the party.
According to political analysts, after these threatening orders, the members of the National and Provincial Assembly are also worried and they believe that this method of politics is not right in any way and it will harm the party further in the coming time.
On the other hand, senior leader Sher Afzal Marwat, who was not invited to the party meeting has said that PTI is becoming a ‘family business’ and nobody is listening to workers and party leaders while decisions are being taken either by sisters of Khan or his wife. Sher Afzal Marwat also made it clear that if the call for protest by the PTI founder comes from his wife or sisters, then the workers will not come out on their instructions. The workers will come out only on the party’s call and Khan’s family members are not ‘party leadership’.
Marwat also expressed reservations that the final call of November 24 had been announced without mobilizing workers and a final call would face a disastrous failure. Since PTI has already lost the power of protest then what option lies with PTI to remain in the news? That is of course webbing a narrative of ‘rapprochement with the establishment’.
Political analysts believe after all the failures and falling victim to factions and confusion, PTI and its senior leadership have started propagandizing that they are holding talks with the establishment regarding some kind of deal, although there is no truth in this. A day ago, a British newspaper also claimed that the founder of PTI was talking to the establishment and the Pakistan Army. They are ready to do it, but the establishment and the Pakistan Army are completely denying this. The Pakistan Army and the establishment have expressed it many times before that it has nothing to do with political dialogue and this mandate lies only with political parties and it should be done by them. In the last year, PTI has eroded its relations with almost all political parties including JUI with whom it was on negotiating terms. Therefore, it has no leverage left to negotiate with the ruling party PMLN, or collaborating parties such as PPP, JUI, etc. PMLN has categorically said that any tangible relations with PTI are possible if PTI tenders an unconditional apology over what it did on May 9, 2023, against state institutions and PTI should also leave the politics of attacking state institutions such as the Pakistan Army.
In simple words, no political leverage left with PTI now as it has already lost power to disrupt urban areas, nobody is trusting it within the political sphere and its policy of getting foreign support has failed. Moreover, effective crackdowns on tools of social media have disrupted the inflow of disinformation among the masses so blackmailing tools are no more as effective as they had been in the past. Yes, one tool is still active and that is spreading the false narrative of CBMs through mainstream media and here media policy of the sitting government is yet to be successful.
Political analysts also say that the founder of PTI has now understood that his call for protest cannot be successful. The conscious people of Pakistan have expressed their indifference to the politics of protests, sit-ins, and chaos that the senior leadership of PTI has done before, rejected their violent narrative, and proved that now the conscious people of Pakistan want the economic development of the country, want a better future for their children and themselves, therefore they have nothing to do with the violent politics of PTI.
