The Game Changer

Election of Elahi as Punjab’s CM has stabilised the turbulent political scene in the country’s largest province

With Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, an experienced and pragmatic politician, sitting pretty in Punjab as chief minister, Pakistan Tehreek Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan would be a less worried man than he probably was in April when he and his party had lost power both in Islamabad and the provincial capital Lahore. The election of Pervaiz Elahi as Punjab’s chief minister, following the 17 July by-elections, has stabilised the turbulent political scene in the country’s largest province. A big political development has taken place that the Lahore city, the bastion of political support of the Sharifs for the last three decades, no longer belongs to them.

The fact that the interim Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government in Punjab, led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s son Hama Shehbaz, could barely survive two months and three weeks, has dented the effective administrative authority of the PML-N-PPP government at the federal capital. It’s a huge setback for the PML-N’s standing in Punjab as it lost 16 out of 20 provincial seats.

The PML-N has for long enjoyed the reputation of being the most popular party in the northern and the central Punjab. It had been claiming that it would win 16 out of 20 seats. In the hometown of the Sharifs, Lahore, the party won only in one out of three constituencies in a by-election at a time when the provincial and federal administrations were under its thumb. It lost in certain constituencies by a wide margin of more than 10,000 votes.

The myth that Lahore belonged to the Sharif dynasty lay shattered when the by-elections’ results came out. The Sharifs have ruled over Punjab for 20 years on five different occasions in the past three decades and spent the bulk of the provincial development budget on the provincial capital, Lahore, to strengthen their political base. In this city, they had almost wiped out the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) of the once most popular leader Benazir Bhutto. In this stronghold, at least for the time being, Imran Khan has swept the carpet under the feet of the Sharifs.

The loss of Lahore is no small setback for the Sharifs. Lahore sets the tone of politics for the rest of the Punjab. The Sharifs’ dwindling political popularity in the city was visible not only in the outcome of the July by-election but in the public gatherings organised by the PML-N afterwards.

While thousands of enthusiastic, charged supporters of Imran Khan thronged the city’s Liberty Chowk — nicknamed Al-Tehrir Chowk La Egypt due to frequent PTI gatherings on the site — the PML-N, too tried its luck there, but failed miserably to demonstrate its street power. On July 24, the party organised a public function at Liberty Chowk and brought fun artists, such as much talked-about Allah Rakha Pepsi aka Pani Puri, to pull the crowd but the venue was almost empty. Hardly a few hundred PML-N workers attended the event.

So far, the PTI has been consistent in its shows of strength in Lahore. On the night preceding the Independence Day, Imran Khan addressed a tumultuous crowd for more than one-and-half hours in hot and sultry monsoon weather. More than 8.0 million viewers turned to it on Youtube. As a contrast, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s address to the nation the same evening was viewed by not merely a little more than one hundred thousand people. Despite the fact that a major television channel covering PTI’s public meetings is off the air, and only a couple of television stations have been covering the PTI shows and press conferences, Imran Khan’s narrative has become more and more popular in the public. This also shows the limits of the state’s power in controlling the popular mood.

Leaving aside the factors behind rising popularity of Imran Khan since his ouster from the office, it is evident that his political opponents have failed to defeat him among the public despite using state apparatus at their disposal. Imran Khan has emerged as the most popular leader of the new generation, the Millennial and Generation Z. His appeals cut across the regional, ethnic divide. From Peshawar to Lahore and Karachi, no other leader can claim so much recognition. The government’s efforts to curb the voices in his support on social media have not delivered much. Overseas Pakistanis could not be silenced. Millions of people follow and listen to the PTI leaders on social media platforms.

In the aftermath of the thumping victory in the 17 July bye-elections in Punjab, and formation of the provincial government in alliance with the PML-Q, some may have expected Imran Khan becoming aggressive in dealing with his opponents, but he chose the opposite path.

The regaining of power in Punjab for the PTI has proved to be a game changer not only in Pakistan’s most populous province but national politics as well.  Imran Khan became somewhat moderate in his approach. In his Independence Day speech in Lahore, and in the following several public talks, he did not emphasise on holding of an early general election. The PTI chief seems to be happy with having his party’s government in four units, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab, Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan. As high inflation makes the PM Shehbaz Sharif federal government unpopular day by day, Imran Khan is giving his opponents, the PPP and the PML-N in particular, a long rope to hang themselves.

The PTI chief seems to be acting on a dual approach. One, expecting a sudden call for snap general election from the government, Imran Khan is busy in mobilising public support by organising rallies after rallies all over the country and through a favourable narrative promoted on social media. On the other hand, signs are there that he has opened a channel of communication with the establishment and is no mood of confrontation with it despite the fact that the federal government is making all efforts to provoke him with cases of sedition registered against his supporters and ill treatment meted out to his close aide Shehbaz Gill. Imran Khan has not taken the bait. In his speech on 18 August, Imran Khan actually appealed to the deep state to review its support for the Sharif and Zardari families.

Punjab has changed it all – both Imran Khan and the state institutions. The 17 July by-elections sent a strong message to the powers-that-be; Imran Khan is not a history.