sur
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2009
- Messages
- 2,829
- Reaction score
- 4
PTI | Imran Khan's Political Desk.
- Thread starter Conqueror
- Start date
sur
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2009
- Messages
- 2,829
- Reaction score
- 4
batmannow
ELITE MEMBER
- Joined
- Jan 28, 2008
- Messages
- 18,830
- Reaction score
- -19
- Country
- Location
Dictatorship is potentially far better than democracy at getting things done, because a dictator isn't encumbered by parliaments or fear of losing elections. IF a dictator is honest and acts for the greater or common good, his reign can be wonderful. The Good (Roman) Emperors of the second century demonstrate this quite clearly. Under present conditions, dictatorship is more essential than ever, since democracy by its very nature just can't force people to do without their favorite spending programs, consume less, or have fewer kids. Considering that the alternatives are either dictatorship or economic/environmental disaster, we had better quickly change current, negative perceptions of dictatorship
.
imran needs a marshall law to begain his political journey!
Al Bhatti
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Nov 16, 2009
- Messages
- 5,686
- Reaction score
- 6
- Country
- Location
Jun 23, 2012
Imran Khan gears up for Pakistan vote, though his plans remain unclear
For 25 years, two political dynasties, the Bhutto and Sharif families, have wrestled each other and the military for political control of Pakistan. None has been able to get to grips with the country's myriad problems, which currently include two civil wars, a dire economy that can't feed half the population and a system of governance choked by corruption and ineptitude.
The lack of a credible political alternative, and the absence of any visible national progress, had left many Pakistanis disillusioned and fearful for their future.
A growing number are now looking to Imran Khan as a saviour-in-waiting. He is probably the most recognisable face in Pakistan, adored for leading his country to victory in the 1992 Cricket World Cup, and admired for his ambitious philanthropic ventures, which include the establishment of a specialist cancer hospital and a university.
However, Khan's 16-year political career as the head of the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (Movement for Justice) party had, until last year, made no real impact.
His decision to boycott the February 2008 general election - the first after nine years of military rule - was widely dismissed as naive, and most commentators stereotyped him as a noisemaker lacking the political acumen to translate his popularity into votes.
At least, that is, until last October, when Khan relaunched his party with a series of public rallies, memorably one in Lahore that drew several hundred thousand people.
Khan had politically arrived, finally, as a credible alternative to the Bhutto-led ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and Sharif-led opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
"He's an achiever", says M Ziauddin, executive editor of The Express Tribune, a leading English-language newspaper.
"He established the cancer hospital against all the odds. Now he's set up a university. He has achieved, and that is his great plus."
Notably, Khan has demonstrated his ability to mobilise the country's youth and the educated middle class, a segment of Pakistani society that has traditionally favoured military rule over populist democracy, and rarely votes.
Commentators say Khan now has the chance to make the mainstream political parties look tired. Indeed, he has positioned his political brand as one that will sweep away an ugly era of corruption.
However, he has offered little of substance about what he might do as prime minister. The reason, critics say, is Khan runs his party as an autocrat. That has led to frequent reshuffles in its structure, preventing its emergence as a proper political machine.
"After 16 or 17 years in politics, Khan is still a novice. He is bereft of any policy. He doesn't have a team, and the team he has ... won't contest anything he says," says Aamir Ghauri, a former director of two Pakistan cable news channels, ARY News and Dunya.
It is only really possible to evaluate Khan's vision from his few public statements and his 2011 book, Pakistan: A Personal History, a best seller in both English and Urdu.
The area he has offered most clarity on is the economy. He has said he plans to declare a "revenue emergency" as soon as he takes office and will get tough on personal taxation and the fiscal deficit. He also intends to divert expenditure towards providing better education, health care and other social services.
All this sounds excellent, but Khan and his party have not come up with any documentation to show how they would go about it.
In Pakistan, he also remarked that it is impossible for the country to ever pay off its foreign debt. But the country's foreign debt, at between 55 to 60 per cent of GDP, is not large, and is certainly lower than that of most western countries.
"Foreign debt is not an enormous burden on the Pakistani economy. The problem is excessive domestic borrowing," says Ziauddin.
Here, Khan loses out to Nawaz Sharif, the former two-time prime minister and leader of the PML-N. An accomplished businessman, Sharif is acknowledged as having a clear economic agenda.
The bedrock of Khan's foreign policy is the withdrawal of Pakistan from the international war on terrorism. He argues, justifiably, that the country has lost far more than it has gained from its post-September 11 alliance with the United States.
He has repeatedly claimed that he can bring an end to the militant insurgency in Pakistan's federally administered tribal areas, or Fata, along the border with Afghanistan in 90 days. To do so, he would activate a South African-style truth and reconciliation commission.
Experts dismiss his promise as impossible. They point out that Khan is not a Fata resident and wouldn't have spent more than a couple of days there before the violence erupted in 2004 (his book mentions the odd hunting trip to South Waziristan, the ancestral family home of his late mother).
Commentators agree that Khan's rhetoric, while short on substance, represented his evolution from the angry man of Pakistani politics to the leader of a party about to commence electoral battle. That transition marked his firm grasp of some electoral realities.
For the past 25 years, approximately one-third of Pakistanis have voted for the Bhutto dynasty and their left-of-centre PPP party, and two-thirds have voted against it. Khan's political stances are clearly aimed at the right-wing majority, which is split between various factions of the Pakistan Muslim League (by far the largest is headed by Sharif) and a handful of religious parties.
To win, Khan would have to overcome these odds. That is an extraordinarily big challenge.
In Lahore, a PML-N fortress, he would have to overcome winning margins from the 2008 election ranging from 21,000 to 58,000 votes, according to Suhail Warraich, political editor of Geo News, Pakistan's most popular cable channel.
That has forced Khan to make some serious compromises. Since October, his party has been inundated with defectors from the Muslim League factions and religious parties, and the odd disenchanted PPP politician.
Despite consternation among the founding activists of Khan's party, the arrival of professional politicians has significantly boosted his electoral chances.
"Compared to the last election, Khan is now in a much better position. Last time, he didn't have a single electable candidate, save himself. Now he has 50 to 60 new party members who have either won or been runners-up at previous elections. As such, he can now field 30 to 35 winnable candidates," said Warraich, who has written several best-selling political histories.
But if all those potential winners were to win, Khan would still be more than 100 constituencies short of a parliamentary majority.
Tactically, Khan is best positioned in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab, the two northern provinces. He is yet to make any inroads in Sindh, the PPP's ancestral home in the south, or in Balochistan, the huge but sparsely populated province in the west that is currently in the grip of a nationalist insurgency (as opposed to the militant insurgency in the Fata).
But Khan could easily find himself outwitted in Punjab, where his candidates could further divide the right-wing vote.
He may stand his best chance in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, where Sharif is a bit player and voters have become disillusioned with both secular nationalists and fundamentalists.
Khan's rhetoric plays especially well there because voters have suffered terribly in the war on terror, having often found themselves sandwiched between militants, the military and a host of foreign spy agencies.
However, most commentators believe Khan's role, for the time being, would be that of a catalyst, offering a political leadership role to the middle class that it does not have in the established political parties.
Potentially, his party could emerge as a leading second-tier political party and, to some extent, play a pivotal role in the coalition-building process that would invariably follow the election scheduled for early next year.
But Khan has repeatedly said he would not sit in government unless his party wins a majority - which could mean he would revert to type, and sit on the sidelines doing little more than casting aspersions on those participating in governance.
Therein lies the terrible responsibility that Khan has taken upon himself.
"There's a big risk: if Khan proves to be a political failure, he would have disillusioned the youth and middle class - two entire segments of society," said Ghauri, the former TV channel director.
Imran Khan gears up for Pakistan vote, though his plans remain unclear - The National
Imran Khan gears up for Pakistan vote, though his plans remain unclear
For 25 years, two political dynasties, the Bhutto and Sharif families, have wrestled each other and the military for political control of Pakistan. None has been able to get to grips with the country's myriad problems, which currently include two civil wars, a dire economy that can't feed half the population and a system of governance choked by corruption and ineptitude.
The lack of a credible political alternative, and the absence of any visible national progress, had left many Pakistanis disillusioned and fearful for their future.
A growing number are now looking to Imran Khan as a saviour-in-waiting. He is probably the most recognisable face in Pakistan, adored for leading his country to victory in the 1992 Cricket World Cup, and admired for his ambitious philanthropic ventures, which include the establishment of a specialist cancer hospital and a university.
However, Khan's 16-year political career as the head of the Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf (Movement for Justice) party had, until last year, made no real impact.
His decision to boycott the February 2008 general election - the first after nine years of military rule - was widely dismissed as naive, and most commentators stereotyped him as a noisemaker lacking the political acumen to translate his popularity into votes.
At least, that is, until last October, when Khan relaunched his party with a series of public rallies, memorably one in Lahore that drew several hundred thousand people.
Khan had politically arrived, finally, as a credible alternative to the Bhutto-led ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and Sharif-led opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
"He's an achiever", says M Ziauddin, executive editor of The Express Tribune, a leading English-language newspaper.
"He established the cancer hospital against all the odds. Now he's set up a university. He has achieved, and that is his great plus."
Notably, Khan has demonstrated his ability to mobilise the country's youth and the educated middle class, a segment of Pakistani society that has traditionally favoured military rule over populist democracy, and rarely votes.
Commentators say Khan now has the chance to make the mainstream political parties look tired. Indeed, he has positioned his political brand as one that will sweep away an ugly era of corruption.
However, he has offered little of substance about what he might do as prime minister. The reason, critics say, is Khan runs his party as an autocrat. That has led to frequent reshuffles in its structure, preventing its emergence as a proper political machine.
"After 16 or 17 years in politics, Khan is still a novice. He is bereft of any policy. He doesn't have a team, and the team he has ... won't contest anything he says," says Aamir Ghauri, a former director of two Pakistan cable news channels, ARY News and Dunya.
It is only really possible to evaluate Khan's vision from his few public statements and his 2011 book, Pakistan: A Personal History, a best seller in both English and Urdu.
The area he has offered most clarity on is the economy. He has said he plans to declare a "revenue emergency" as soon as he takes office and will get tough on personal taxation and the fiscal deficit. He also intends to divert expenditure towards providing better education, health care and other social services.
All this sounds excellent, but Khan and his party have not come up with any documentation to show how they would go about it.
In Pakistan, he also remarked that it is impossible for the country to ever pay off its foreign debt. But the country's foreign debt, at between 55 to 60 per cent of GDP, is not large, and is certainly lower than that of most western countries.
"Foreign debt is not an enormous burden on the Pakistani economy. The problem is excessive domestic borrowing," says Ziauddin.
Here, Khan loses out to Nawaz Sharif, the former two-time prime minister and leader of the PML-N. An accomplished businessman, Sharif is acknowledged as having a clear economic agenda.
The bedrock of Khan's foreign policy is the withdrawal of Pakistan from the international war on terrorism. He argues, justifiably, that the country has lost far more than it has gained from its post-September 11 alliance with the United States.
He has repeatedly claimed that he can bring an end to the militant insurgency in Pakistan's federally administered tribal areas, or Fata, along the border with Afghanistan in 90 days. To do so, he would activate a South African-style truth and reconciliation commission.
Experts dismiss his promise as impossible. They point out that Khan is not a Fata resident and wouldn't have spent more than a couple of days there before the violence erupted in 2004 (his book mentions the odd hunting trip to South Waziristan, the ancestral family home of his late mother).
Commentators agree that Khan's rhetoric, while short on substance, represented his evolution from the angry man of Pakistani politics to the leader of a party about to commence electoral battle. That transition marked his firm grasp of some electoral realities.
For the past 25 years, approximately one-third of Pakistanis have voted for the Bhutto dynasty and their left-of-centre PPP party, and two-thirds have voted against it. Khan's political stances are clearly aimed at the right-wing majority, which is split between various factions of the Pakistan Muslim League (by far the largest is headed by Sharif) and a handful of religious parties.
To win, Khan would have to overcome these odds. That is an extraordinarily big challenge.
In Lahore, a PML-N fortress, he would have to overcome winning margins from the 2008 election ranging from 21,000 to 58,000 votes, according to Suhail Warraich, political editor of Geo News, Pakistan's most popular cable channel.
That has forced Khan to make some serious compromises. Since October, his party has been inundated with defectors from the Muslim League factions and religious parties, and the odd disenchanted PPP politician.
Despite consternation among the founding activists of Khan's party, the arrival of professional politicians has significantly boosted his electoral chances.
"Compared to the last election, Khan is now in a much better position. Last time, he didn't have a single electable candidate, save himself. Now he has 50 to 60 new party members who have either won or been runners-up at previous elections. As such, he can now field 30 to 35 winnable candidates," said Warraich, who has written several best-selling political histories.
But if all those potential winners were to win, Khan would still be more than 100 constituencies short of a parliamentary majority.
Tactically, Khan is best positioned in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab, the two northern provinces. He is yet to make any inroads in Sindh, the PPP's ancestral home in the south, or in Balochistan, the huge but sparsely populated province in the west that is currently in the grip of a nationalist insurgency (as opposed to the militant insurgency in the Fata).
But Khan could easily find himself outwitted in Punjab, where his candidates could further divide the right-wing vote.
He may stand his best chance in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, where Sharif is a bit player and voters have become disillusioned with both secular nationalists and fundamentalists.
Khan's rhetoric plays especially well there because voters have suffered terribly in the war on terror, having often found themselves sandwiched between militants, the military and a host of foreign spy agencies.
However, most commentators believe Khan's role, for the time being, would be that of a catalyst, offering a political leadership role to the middle class that it does not have in the established political parties.
Potentially, his party could emerge as a leading second-tier political party and, to some extent, play a pivotal role in the coalition-building process that would invariably follow the election scheduled for early next year.
But Khan has repeatedly said he would not sit in government unless his party wins a majority - which could mean he would revert to type, and sit on the sidelines doing little more than casting aspersions on those participating in governance.
Therein lies the terrible responsibility that Khan has taken upon himself.
"There's a big risk: if Khan proves to be a political failure, he would have disillusioned the youth and middle class - two entire segments of society," said Ghauri, the former TV channel director.
Imran Khan gears up for Pakistan vote, though his plans remain unclear - The National
sur
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Aug 19, 2009
- Messages
- 2,829
- Reaction score
- 4
fatman17
PDF THINK TANK: CONSULTANT
- Joined
- Apr 24, 2007
- Messages
- 32,563
- Reaction score
- 98
- Country
- Location
Hope and Change and Imran Khan
By Reza Jan
November 7, 2011
In Pakistani politics, when one is widely compared to the country’s most famous (infamous?) political grandmaster, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (president from 1971 to 1973 and prime minister from 1973 to 1977), it is time to pay attention. This is the notoriety now being accorded Imran Khan, a Pakistani cricketing hero-turned philanthropist and then politician. The comparisons are remarkable given that a week ago Khan was considered to be a political nobody.
The event that has launched Khan to the forefront of the chattering classes’ political conversation was a rally held by his Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf (PTI) or Pakistan Justice Movement party on October 30 in Lahore, the capital of Punjab province. The rally attracted as many as 100,000 supporters and may have been the largest single political gathering in the country in decades. The number of attendees floored political analysts and rivals alike and convinced many that Khan had finally arrived on the “mainstream political scene.”
The unexpectedly high turnout has rattled the cages of several political entities in Pakistan, but none more so than that of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the high-profile party of former two-time Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, in whose backyard the rally took place and whose core constituency the PTI suddenly appears to be competing for.
The Politics of Opposition
During his speech in Lahore on Sunday, Khan lambasted both the ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the PML-N as being “creatures of the status quo,” blaming them for many of the country’s ills and tapping into a groundswell of public resentment against Pakistan’s unpopular government and general downward trajectory. Khan stumped further on his anti-corruption platform and called on Nawaz Sharif and President Asif Zardari, the PML-N and PPP leaders respectively, to declare their real assets. He threatened to start a massive civil disobedience movement and to form a special cell to investigate and declare their assets if they failed to do so.
Khan’s politics have always been the politics of opposition. The hero of Pakistan’s 1992 cricket world cup victory, when he first entered into politics in 1996 he made considerably less than a splash. The PTI was resoundingly defeated in the 1997 general elections and won just one seat out of 272 in 2002. The party currently has no seats in parliament owing to Khan’s boycott of the 2008 general election. He has himself in the past acknowledged that his party is “never going to win the traditional way.”
Khan has, instead, taken the route of populist politics. He has large support bases among the youth, particularly those in urbanized parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and central Punjab, who are disillusioned with the corrupt seesawing of status quo parties. Khan’s actual politics would be characterized as right-leaning and his party is often considered to be a cuddlier version of Pakistan’s Islamist political parties such as the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI).
One of the pillars of his growing support is his opposition to unpopular U.S. foreign policy in the region and to Pakistan’s cooperation with the U.S. in the war on terror. Khan is flatly opposed to U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan and seeks to end Pakistani participation in the war on terror, which he characterizes as having been undertaken purely for financial gain. He favors talks with Islamist militants and seeks a negotiated settlement to the conflict. Speaking on Sunday, Khan said “My message to America is that we will have friendship with you, but we will not accept any slavery….We will help you in a respectable withdrawal of your troops from Afghanistan, but we will not launch a military operation in Pakistan for you.”
Khan seeks to remedy Pakistan’s perceived slavishness to foreign powers by ending its dependency on foreign aid. He calls for reform of the taxation system and a crackdown on tax corruption, saying the Rs 3 trillion ($34.83 billion) lost to such sleaze could easily make up for foreign aid refused from other nations. That said, beyond his generic declarations against tax corruption and his desire to widen the tax base to include agriculture, the largest and thus far completely untaxed section of the Pakistani economy, Khan’s platform is decidedly vague. There is similarly little contour in his pronounced intentions to declare an “education emergency” or to aim for the establishment of an “Islamic welfare state.”
Splitting the vote
The October 30 rally made a big impression on Pakistan’s politics gurus; it threatened to seriously upend the conventional understanding of Pakistan’s political fabric. On no one did this have a bigger impression than the PML-N. Khan’s rally took place in Lahore, the PML-N’s stomping ground. The rally and its outcome was a shot across the PML-N’s bow and signaled that the PML-N’s traditional vote bank could no longer be taken for granted.
Central and northern Punjab comprise some of the most densely-populated areas in the country and hold a large number of seats in the country’s lower house, the National Assembly. This region has traditionally voted most strongly for the PML-N. The PTI has, however, started to erode the PML-N’s hold over the region. Khan, as part of his grassroots campaign, has been holding frequent rallies in Lahore, and stumping his way through population centers such as Faisalabad and Gujranwala, often managing to turn veteran politicians into advocates for his cause. The PTI’s rhetoric against U.S. policy in the region may have helped capture a section of the PML-N’s more right-wing voters, especially given that the PML-N has refrained from publicly participating in increasingly popular America-bashing (probably in the belief that it would need U.S. support if it was to gain and hold power come the next election). Furthermore, demographic changes in the Punjab including increased urbanization and a growing rural middle-class have both led to a re-evaluation of traditional party loyalties.
A big rally does not an election victory make, however. Although the PTI has been cutting a swathe through the Punjab, it has mostly been picking up support in traditionally PML-N constituencies. It has not yet proven itself in parts of the Punjab that have tended to vote for the left-leaning PPP. Furthermore, the PTI has been able to gather strong support in more urbanized areas, but urban voters in Pakistan are historically less likely to vote than their rural counterparts.
Ironically, what this may translate into is that the anti-status quo PTI, rather than pipping the PML-N at the first-past-the-post ballot box, may end up splitting the vote in the Punjab and, as a result, strengthening the electoral prospects of the highly unpopular incumbent PPP government. This potential outcome has strengthened the voices of those among the PTI’s critics who claim the PTI is being backed by the Pakistan Army in order to prevent a PML-N election victory, an outcome the army would like to avoid given the bad blood between the army and PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif. The PML-N has called for increased scrutiny of the military and its annual expenditures, cutting the military budget, and for closer ties to India, all causes that run counter to military interests.
Stay tuned
In the end there is much left to play for and many questions remain unanswered. Barring some political crisis, elections are not set to be held until 2013. While Khan has managed to tap into a strong undercurrent of resentment against status quo politics and anti-American sentiment, whether he will be able to continue to harness and exploit that sentiment until Election Day remains to be seen. It is also unclear whether he will be able to expand his support beyond urban centers and into parts of rural Punjab traditionally held by the PML-N and PPP. While the PTI has made large gains in Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa province, it is still a political minnow in Balochistan and Sindh.
While Khan has used anti-government and anti-American rhetoric to gain large amounts of support, he has yet to demonstrate an ability to break away from the holier-than-thou politics of opposition and demonstrate an aptitude for practical politics. “Not those guys” may be a rousing refrain at a rally, but it is not a party manifesto or a policy document.
That said, the PTI has made remarkable gains in a short time span. It has swelled its party lists through a comprehensive grassroots campaign involving volunteers and social outreach, it has captured the imagination of large sections of the urban youth, and its leader currently polls as the most popular political figure in the nation. While it may be too soon to make any bold predictions about Khan and the direction his PTI is heading in, he now seems able to attract rally audiences the PML-N and PPP could only dream of addressing. The story is unfinished, but a previously overlooked character has recently given himself a serious reintroduction. The PTI’s ability to seriously disrupt the political calculus in Pakistan, and the fact that much of its popularity stems from publicly stoking anti-American sentiment, means its political development is worth keeping a close eye on. Continue to watch this space.
By Reza Jan
November 7, 2011
In Pakistani politics, when one is widely compared to the country’s most famous (infamous?) political grandmaster, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto (president from 1971 to 1973 and prime minister from 1973 to 1977), it is time to pay attention. This is the notoriety now being accorded Imran Khan, a Pakistani cricketing hero-turned philanthropist and then politician. The comparisons are remarkable given that a week ago Khan was considered to be a political nobody.
The event that has launched Khan to the forefront of the chattering classes’ political conversation was a rally held by his Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaaf (PTI) or Pakistan Justice Movement party on October 30 in Lahore, the capital of Punjab province. The rally attracted as many as 100,000 supporters and may have been the largest single political gathering in the country in decades. The number of attendees floored political analysts and rivals alike and convinced many that Khan had finally arrived on the “mainstream political scene.”
The unexpectedly high turnout has rattled the cages of several political entities in Pakistan, but none more so than that of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the high-profile party of former two-time Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, in whose backyard the rally took place and whose core constituency the PTI suddenly appears to be competing for.
The Politics of Opposition
During his speech in Lahore on Sunday, Khan lambasted both the ruling Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the PML-N as being “creatures of the status quo,” blaming them for many of the country’s ills and tapping into a groundswell of public resentment against Pakistan’s unpopular government and general downward trajectory. Khan stumped further on his anti-corruption platform and called on Nawaz Sharif and President Asif Zardari, the PML-N and PPP leaders respectively, to declare their real assets. He threatened to start a massive civil disobedience movement and to form a special cell to investigate and declare their assets if they failed to do so.
Khan’s politics have always been the politics of opposition. The hero of Pakistan’s 1992 cricket world cup victory, when he first entered into politics in 1996 he made considerably less than a splash. The PTI was resoundingly defeated in the 1997 general elections and won just one seat out of 272 in 2002. The party currently has no seats in parliament owing to Khan’s boycott of the 2008 general election. He has himself in the past acknowledged that his party is “never going to win the traditional way.”
Khan has, instead, taken the route of populist politics. He has large support bases among the youth, particularly those in urbanized parts of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and central Punjab, who are disillusioned with the corrupt seesawing of status quo parties. Khan’s actual politics would be characterized as right-leaning and his party is often considered to be a cuddlier version of Pakistan’s Islamist political parties such as the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI).
One of the pillars of his growing support is his opposition to unpopular U.S. foreign policy in the region and to Pakistan’s cooperation with the U.S. in the war on terror. Khan is flatly opposed to U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan and seeks to end Pakistani participation in the war on terror, which he characterizes as having been undertaken purely for financial gain. He favors talks with Islamist militants and seeks a negotiated settlement to the conflict. Speaking on Sunday, Khan said “My message to America is that we will have friendship with you, but we will not accept any slavery….We will help you in a respectable withdrawal of your troops from Afghanistan, but we will not launch a military operation in Pakistan for you.”
Khan seeks to remedy Pakistan’s perceived slavishness to foreign powers by ending its dependency on foreign aid. He calls for reform of the taxation system and a crackdown on tax corruption, saying the Rs 3 trillion ($34.83 billion) lost to such sleaze could easily make up for foreign aid refused from other nations. That said, beyond his generic declarations against tax corruption and his desire to widen the tax base to include agriculture, the largest and thus far completely untaxed section of the Pakistani economy, Khan’s platform is decidedly vague. There is similarly little contour in his pronounced intentions to declare an “education emergency” or to aim for the establishment of an “Islamic welfare state.”
Splitting the vote
The October 30 rally made a big impression on Pakistan’s politics gurus; it threatened to seriously upend the conventional understanding of Pakistan’s political fabric. On no one did this have a bigger impression than the PML-N. Khan’s rally took place in Lahore, the PML-N’s stomping ground. The rally and its outcome was a shot across the PML-N’s bow and signaled that the PML-N’s traditional vote bank could no longer be taken for granted.
Central and northern Punjab comprise some of the most densely-populated areas in the country and hold a large number of seats in the country’s lower house, the National Assembly. This region has traditionally voted most strongly for the PML-N. The PTI has, however, started to erode the PML-N’s hold over the region. Khan, as part of his grassroots campaign, has been holding frequent rallies in Lahore, and stumping his way through population centers such as Faisalabad and Gujranwala, often managing to turn veteran politicians into advocates for his cause. The PTI’s rhetoric against U.S. policy in the region may have helped capture a section of the PML-N’s more right-wing voters, especially given that the PML-N has refrained from publicly participating in increasingly popular America-bashing (probably in the belief that it would need U.S. support if it was to gain and hold power come the next election). Furthermore, demographic changes in the Punjab including increased urbanization and a growing rural middle-class have both led to a re-evaluation of traditional party loyalties.
A big rally does not an election victory make, however. Although the PTI has been cutting a swathe through the Punjab, it has mostly been picking up support in traditionally PML-N constituencies. It has not yet proven itself in parts of the Punjab that have tended to vote for the left-leaning PPP. Furthermore, the PTI has been able to gather strong support in more urbanized areas, but urban voters in Pakistan are historically less likely to vote than their rural counterparts.
Ironically, what this may translate into is that the anti-status quo PTI, rather than pipping the PML-N at the first-past-the-post ballot box, may end up splitting the vote in the Punjab and, as a result, strengthening the electoral prospects of the highly unpopular incumbent PPP government. This potential outcome has strengthened the voices of those among the PTI’s critics who claim the PTI is being backed by the Pakistan Army in order to prevent a PML-N election victory, an outcome the army would like to avoid given the bad blood between the army and PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif. The PML-N has called for increased scrutiny of the military and its annual expenditures, cutting the military budget, and for closer ties to India, all causes that run counter to military interests.
Stay tuned
In the end there is much left to play for and many questions remain unanswered. Barring some political crisis, elections are not set to be held until 2013. While Khan has managed to tap into a strong undercurrent of resentment against status quo politics and anti-American sentiment, whether he will be able to continue to harness and exploit that sentiment until Election Day remains to be seen. It is also unclear whether he will be able to expand his support beyond urban centers and into parts of rural Punjab traditionally held by the PML-N and PPP. While the PTI has made large gains in Khyber-Pukhtunkhwa province, it is still a political minnow in Balochistan and Sindh.
While Khan has used anti-government and anti-American rhetoric to gain large amounts of support, he has yet to demonstrate an ability to break away from the holier-than-thou politics of opposition and demonstrate an aptitude for practical politics. “Not those guys” may be a rousing refrain at a rally, but it is not a party manifesto or a policy document.
That said, the PTI has made remarkable gains in a short time span. It has swelled its party lists through a comprehensive grassroots campaign involving volunteers and social outreach, it has captured the imagination of large sections of the urban youth, and its leader currently polls as the most popular political figure in the nation. While it may be too soon to make any bold predictions about Khan and the direction his PTI is heading in, he now seems able to attract rally audiences the PML-N and PPP could only dream of addressing. The story is unfinished, but a previously overlooked character has recently given himself a serious reintroduction. The PTI’s ability to seriously disrupt the political calculus in Pakistan, and the fact that much of its popularity stems from publicly stoking anti-American sentiment, means its political development is worth keeping a close eye on. Continue to watch this space.
Leader
ELITE MEMBER
- Joined
- Sep 7, 2010
- Messages
- 29,159
- Reaction score
- 9
- Country
- Location
Why I love to hate Imran!
I am a simple person with simple needs and unlimited wants. I live my life like life should be lived - self-servingly, of course. Hey! I didn’t make the rules, survival of the fittest is God’s own natural order; I am just honest enough to own it. I can be a PPP jiyala just as easily as I can be a PML-N nirala, but one thing I can never be and that is an Imran Khan supporter. That man is beyond my comprehension - irritating goody two shoes. He is not even a true politician; just look at him, a corruption free past, sincerity to Pakistan, philanthropist to boot and on top of that good looking! If I didn’t know better that almost declares him unfit to be living in Pakistan, what to say of entering Pakistani politics - such a wannabe!
I had such a laugh seeing the affront of all those PTI trolls (a term I have borrowed from a very enlightened individual like myself - PTI troll, how droll) at the recent accusation hurled at Imran Khan for misusing the funds meant for Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH), by none other than the minion of our very own PML-N. Now that is what I call political savvy, not some two-bit speech about Pakistan’s potential, justice, accountability or eradicating corruption. What does he think corruption is, ‘Polio’?
Such poor sportsmanship these PTI trolls exhibit, I tell you, beating the drum of dastardly tactics serving only to harm all those poor patients being treated at the SKMCH since no one really takes corruption charges against Imran Khan seriously. His track record speaks for itself and all. I fail to understand what that has to do with anything. Politics is politics, I accuse you, you accuse me, why deny. Imran Khan’s problem is that he has nothing to deny, like I said so unfit for Pakistani politics.
Tell me this, if Imran Khan is really all that he seems to be, why the need to induct these electibles (courtesy yet another enlightened individual) into his party. If he was truly this reformer holding the flag of ideological politics, then he should have stood his ground with his team of virtually unknown and habitually honest individuals, replaced the entire population of Pakistan with the likes of him and his party members, and then boasted of bringing a change. Doesn’t he know that one can’t teach an old dog new tricks?
This population of 180 million only knows how to be downtrodden. They are not resilient; they are complacent. Tell them it is God’s will that they be oppressed and they will nod their heads and do all the ‘ji hazuri’ you want them to do. How dare Imran Khan challenge that status quo, how dare he awakens them to the immense power they hold. Doesn’t he realise that he is courting anarchy, if there is an uprising? What will become of the likes of me, who are only meant to rule? It is the duty of each and every one of us that the continued state of existence is unaffected by such ideological upstarts as Imran Khan. Power to the people, indeed, sounds more like chaos to me!
I will give you another example of political naivety. Mr Cricketer these days is all gung ho on holding intra-party elections after Eid. What a riot! Imagine creating a system where even the party worker has an opportunity to affect the policies of the party, where a true democracy can be forged from within the party, extending the same opportunity to all and sundry once it gets elected. God forbid that happens! This man is so mulishly stubborn that despite repeated efforts, he is unable to understand that certain classes are meant to rule and all others are meant to serve. That is the order of things and it is better for all to integrate oneself in this scheme, rather than to oppose it. Not that me and others did not give him ample opportunities for this integration. Time and again we offered him ministries, seats in Parliament, money, clout what not; but if your disposition is disagreeable nothing will sway you from the path of righteousness; more like the path of obtuseness if you ask me.
If only he had not been able to pull all those people to his rallies in Lahore and Karachi. In the least, if he would have stopped short of doing that relatively smaller yet successful jalsa in Quetta and I would not have been impelled to notice that he even existed; but as it comes about he has become a regular thorn in my side and the polls are not helping either. I am sure their rigged, nevertheless, they are causing some serious hypertension relieved only by the sporadic slurring done by the PPP jiyalas and the PML-N niralas (bless their vile tongues).
I have to be satisfied by the fact that nothing and no one can unite this nation into bringing an end to the misery it is suffering today. I shudder to think what would happen if the entire population of only Islamabad suddenly awakens to its true power potential, comes out on the streets and marches towards the presidency. But I am thankful that chances for such abhorrent behaviour are slim at most, so no immediate danger to my rank and wealth.
In the meantime, I must ensure that this budding hope people seem to be developing based on Imran Khan is dashed at its earliest. Hope is malevolent, it incites people into action and that would be disastrous. So, I continue my campaign against Imran Khan and all he does, says or thinks indiscriminatingly for the betterment of myself, since if I am prosperous that means I can still milk Pakistan for all its worth. It is no wonder, indeed, why I love to hate Imran Khan!
The writer is a freelance columnist.
Email: markazeyaqeen@gmail.com
Why I love to hate Imran! | The Nation
Why I love to hate Imran!
I am a simple person with simple needs and unlimited wants. I live my life like life should be lived - self-servingly, of course. Hey! I didnt make the rules, survival of the fittest is Gods own natural order; I am just honest enough to own it. I can be a PPP jiyala just as easily as I can be a PML-N nirala, but one thing I can never be and that is an Imran Khan supporter. That man is beyond my comprehension - irritating goody two shoes. He is not even a true politician; just look at him, a corruption free past, sincerity to Pakistan, philanthropist to boot and on top of that good looking! If I didnt know better that almost declares him unfit to be living in Pakistan, what to say of entering Pakistani politics - such a wannabe!
I had such a laugh seeing the affront of all those PTI trolls (a term I have borrowed from a very enlightened individual like myself - PTI troll, how droll) at the recent accusation hurled at Imran Khan for misusing the funds meant for Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH), by none other than the minion of our very own PML-N. Now that is what I call political savvy, not some two-bit speech about Pakistans potential, justice, accountability or eradicating corruption. What does he think corruption is, Polio?
Such poor sportsmanship these PTI trolls exhibit, I tell you, beating the drum of dastardly tactics serving only to harm all those poor patients being treated at the SKMCH since no one really takes corruption charges against Imran Khan seriously. His track record speaks for itself and all. I fail to understand what that has to do with anything. Politics is politics, I accuse you, you accuse me, why deny. Imran Khans problem is that he has nothing to deny, like I said so unfit for Pakistani politics.
Tell me this, if Imran Khan is really all that he seems to be, why the need to induct these electibles (courtesy yet another enlightened individual) into his party. If he was truly this reformer holding the flag of ideological politics, then he should have stood his ground with his team of virtually unknown and habitually honest individuals, replaced the entire population of Pakistan with the likes of him and his party members, and then boasted of bringing a change. Doesnt he know that one cant teach an old dog new tricks?
This population of 180 million only knows how to be downtrodden. They are not resilient; they are complacent. Tell them it is Gods will that they be oppressed and they will nod their heads and do all the ji hazuri you want them to do. How dare Imran Khan challenge that status quo, how dare he awakens them to the immense power they hold. Doesnt he realise that he is courting anarchy, if there is an uprising? What will become of the likes of me, who are only meant to rule? It is the duty of each and every one of us that the continued state of existence is unaffected by such ideological upstarts as Imran Khan. Power to the people, indeed, sounds more like chaos to me!
I will give you another example of political naivety. Mr Cricketer these days is all gung ho on holding intra-party elections after Eid. What a riot! Imagine creating a system where even the party worker has an opportunity to affect the policies of the party, where a true democracy can be forged from within the party, extending the same opportunity to all and sundry once it gets elected. God forbid that happens! This man is so mulishly stubborn that despite repeated efforts, he is unable to understand that certain classes are meant to rule and all others are meant to serve. That is the order of things and it is better for all to integrate oneself in this scheme, rather than to oppose it. Not that me and others did not give him ample opportunities for this integration. Time and again we offered him ministries, seats in Parliament, money, clout what not; but if your disposition is disagreeable nothing will sway you from the path of righteousness; more like the path of obtuseness if you ask me.
If only he had not been able to pull all those people to his rallies in Lahore and Karachi. In the least, if he would have stopped short of doing that relatively smaller yet successful jalsa in Quetta and I would not have been impelled to notice that he even existed; but as it comes about he has become a regular thorn in my side and the polls are not helping either. I am sure their rigged, nevertheless, they are causing some serious hypertension relieved only by the sporadic slurring done by the PPP jiyalas and the PML-N niralas (bless their vile tongues).
I have to be satisfied by the fact that nothing and no one can unite this nation into bringing an end to the misery it is suffering today. I shudder to think what would happen if the entire population of only Islamabad suddenly awakens to its true power potential, comes out on the streets and marches towards the presidency. But I am thankful that chances for such abhorrent behaviour are slim at most, so no immediate danger to my rank and wealth.
In the meantime, I must ensure that this budding hope people seem to be developing based on Imran Khan is dashed at its earliest. Hope is malevolent, it incites people into action and that would be disastrous. So, I continue my campaign against Imran Khan and all he does, says or thinks indiscriminatingly for the betterment of myself, since if I am prosperous that means I can still milk Pakistan for all its worth. It is no wonder, indeed, why I love to hate Imran Khan!
The writer is a freelance columnist.
Email: markazeyaqeen@gmail.com
Why I love to hate Imran! | The Nation
I am a simple person with simple needs and unlimited wants. I live my life like life should be lived - self-servingly, of course. Hey! I didn’t make the rules, survival of the fittest is God’s own natural order; I am just honest enough to own it. I can be a PPP jiyala just as easily as I can be a PML-N nirala, but one thing I can never be and that is an Imran Khan supporter. That man is beyond my comprehension - irritating goody two shoes. He is not even a true politician; just look at him, a corruption free past, sincerity to Pakistan, philanthropist to boot and on top of that good looking! If I didn’t know better that almost declares him unfit to be living in Pakistan, what to say of entering Pakistani politics - such a wannabe!
I had such a laugh seeing the affront of all those PTI trolls (a term I have borrowed from a very enlightened individual like myself - PTI troll, how droll) at the recent accusation hurled at Imran Khan for misusing the funds meant for Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH), by none other than the minion of our very own PML-N. Now that is what I call political savvy, not some two-bit speech about Pakistan’s potential, justice, accountability or eradicating corruption. What does he think corruption is, ‘Polio’?
Such poor sportsmanship these PTI trolls exhibit, I tell you, beating the drum of dastardly tactics serving only to harm all those poor patients being treated at the SKMCH since no one really takes corruption charges against Imran Khan seriously. His track record speaks for itself and all. I fail to understand what that has to do with anything. Politics is politics, I accuse you, you accuse me, why deny. Imran Khan’s problem is that he has nothing to deny, like I said so unfit for Pakistani politics.
Tell me this, if Imran Khan is really all that he seems to be, why the need to induct these electibles (courtesy yet another enlightened individual) into his party. If he was truly this reformer holding the flag of ideological politics, then he should have stood his ground with his team of virtually unknown and habitually honest individuals, replaced the entire population of Pakistan with the likes of him and his party members, and then boasted of bringing a change. Doesn’t he know that one can’t teach an old dog new tricks?
This population of 180 million only knows how to be downtrodden. They are not resilient; they are complacent. Tell them it is God’s will that they be oppressed and they will nod their heads and do all the ‘ji hazuri’ you want them to do. How dare Imran Khan challenge that status quo, how dare he awakens them to the immense power they hold. Doesn’t he realise that he is courting anarchy, if there is an uprising? What will become of the likes of me, who are only meant to rule? It is the duty of each and every one of us that the continued state of existence is unaffected by such ideological upstarts as Imran Khan. Power to the people, indeed, sounds more like chaos to me!
I will give you another example of political naivety. Mr Cricketer these days is all gung ho on holding intra-party elections after Eid. What a riot! Imagine creating a system where even the party worker has an opportunity to affect the policies of the party, where a true democracy can be forged from within the party, extending the same opportunity to all and sundry once it gets elected. God forbid that happens! This man is so mulishly stubborn that despite repeated efforts, he is unable to understand that certain classes are meant to rule and all others are meant to serve. That is the order of things and it is better for all to integrate oneself in this scheme, rather than to oppose it. Not that me and others did not give him ample opportunities for this integration. Time and again we offered him ministries, seats in Parliament, money, clout what not; but if your disposition is disagreeable nothing will sway you from the path of righteousness; more like the path of obtuseness if you ask me.
If only he had not been able to pull all those people to his rallies in Lahore and Karachi. In the least, if he would have stopped short of doing that relatively smaller yet successful jalsa in Quetta and I would not have been impelled to notice that he even existed; but as it comes about he has become a regular thorn in my side and the polls are not helping either. I am sure their rigged, nevertheless, they are causing some serious hypertension relieved only by the sporadic slurring done by the PPP jiyalas and the PML-N niralas (bless their vile tongues).
I have to be satisfied by the fact that nothing and no one can unite this nation into bringing an end to the misery it is suffering today. I shudder to think what would happen if the entire population of only Islamabad suddenly awakens to its true power potential, comes out on the streets and marches towards the presidency. But I am thankful that chances for such abhorrent behaviour are slim at most, so no immediate danger to my rank and wealth.
In the meantime, I must ensure that this budding hope people seem to be developing based on Imran Khan is dashed at its earliest. Hope is malevolent, it incites people into action and that would be disastrous. So, I continue my campaign against Imran Khan and all he does, says or thinks indiscriminatingly for the betterment of myself, since if I am prosperous that means I can still milk Pakistan for all its worth. It is no wonder, indeed, why I love to hate Imran Khan!
The writer is a freelance columnist.
Email: markazeyaqeen@gmail.com
Why I love to hate Imran! | The Nation
Why I love to hate Imran!
I am a simple person with simple needs and unlimited wants. I live my life like life should be lived - self-servingly, of course. Hey! I didnt make the rules, survival of the fittest is Gods own natural order; I am just honest enough to own it. I can be a PPP jiyala just as easily as I can be a PML-N nirala, but one thing I can never be and that is an Imran Khan supporter. That man is beyond my comprehension - irritating goody two shoes. He is not even a true politician; just look at him, a corruption free past, sincerity to Pakistan, philanthropist to boot and on top of that good looking! If I didnt know better that almost declares him unfit to be living in Pakistan, what to say of entering Pakistani politics - such a wannabe!
I had such a laugh seeing the affront of all those PTI trolls (a term I have borrowed from a very enlightened individual like myself - PTI troll, how droll) at the recent accusation hurled at Imran Khan for misusing the funds meant for Shaukat Khanum Memorial Cancer Hospital (SKMCH), by none other than the minion of our very own PML-N. Now that is what I call political savvy, not some two-bit speech about Pakistans potential, justice, accountability or eradicating corruption. What does he think corruption is, Polio?
Such poor sportsmanship these PTI trolls exhibit, I tell you, beating the drum of dastardly tactics serving only to harm all those poor patients being treated at the SKMCH since no one really takes corruption charges against Imran Khan seriously. His track record speaks for itself and all. I fail to understand what that has to do with anything. Politics is politics, I accuse you, you accuse me, why deny. Imran Khans problem is that he has nothing to deny, like I said so unfit for Pakistani politics.
Tell me this, if Imran Khan is really all that he seems to be, why the need to induct these electibles (courtesy yet another enlightened individual) into his party. If he was truly this reformer holding the flag of ideological politics, then he should have stood his ground with his team of virtually unknown and habitually honest individuals, replaced the entire population of Pakistan with the likes of him and his party members, and then boasted of bringing a change. Doesnt he know that one cant teach an old dog new tricks?
This population of 180 million only knows how to be downtrodden. They are not resilient; they are complacent. Tell them it is Gods will that they be oppressed and they will nod their heads and do all the ji hazuri you want them to do. How dare Imran Khan challenge that status quo, how dare he awakens them to the immense power they hold. Doesnt he realise that he is courting anarchy, if there is an uprising? What will become of the likes of me, who are only meant to rule? It is the duty of each and every one of us that the continued state of existence is unaffected by such ideological upstarts as Imran Khan. Power to the people, indeed, sounds more like chaos to me!
I will give you another example of political naivety. Mr Cricketer these days is all gung ho on holding intra-party elections after Eid. What a riot! Imagine creating a system where even the party worker has an opportunity to affect the policies of the party, where a true democracy can be forged from within the party, extending the same opportunity to all and sundry once it gets elected. God forbid that happens! This man is so mulishly stubborn that despite repeated efforts, he is unable to understand that certain classes are meant to rule and all others are meant to serve. That is the order of things and it is better for all to integrate oneself in this scheme, rather than to oppose it. Not that me and others did not give him ample opportunities for this integration. Time and again we offered him ministries, seats in Parliament, money, clout what not; but if your disposition is disagreeable nothing will sway you from the path of righteousness; more like the path of obtuseness if you ask me.
If only he had not been able to pull all those people to his rallies in Lahore and Karachi. In the least, if he would have stopped short of doing that relatively smaller yet successful jalsa in Quetta and I would not have been impelled to notice that he even existed; but as it comes about he has become a regular thorn in my side and the polls are not helping either. I am sure their rigged, nevertheless, they are causing some serious hypertension relieved only by the sporadic slurring done by the PPP jiyalas and the PML-N niralas (bless their vile tongues).
I have to be satisfied by the fact that nothing and no one can unite this nation into bringing an end to the misery it is suffering today. I shudder to think what would happen if the entire population of only Islamabad suddenly awakens to its true power potential, comes out on the streets and marches towards the presidency. But I am thankful that chances for such abhorrent behaviour are slim at most, so no immediate danger to my rank and wealth.
In the meantime, I must ensure that this budding hope people seem to be developing based on Imran Khan is dashed at its earliest. Hope is malevolent, it incites people into action and that would be disastrous. So, I continue my campaign against Imran Khan and all he does, says or thinks indiscriminatingly for the betterment of myself, since if I am prosperous that means I can still milk Pakistan for all its worth. It is no wonder, indeed, why I love to hate Imran Khan!
The writer is a freelance columnist.
Email: markazeyaqeen@gmail.com
Why I love to hate Imran! | The Nation
Tameem
BANNED
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2008
- Messages
- 4,468
- Reaction score
- -22
- Country
- Location
This is from Shahzeb Khanzada.......to whom PTIANS likes for exposing Marvi but here he too Right on Spot!
http://www.express.com.pk/images/NP_LHE/20120819/Sub_Images/1101599322-2.gif
http://www.express.com.pk/epaper/PoPupwindow.aspx?newsID=1101599322&Issue=NP_LHE&Date=20120819
AstanoshKhan
<b>PTI: NAYA PAKISTANI</b>
- Joined
- Jun 28, 2009
- Messages
- 3,134
- Reaction score
- 0
- Country
- Location
PTI membership in Pakistan exceeds 1 Crore (10 Million) members!
MEMBERSHIP UPDATE: Pakistan Tehreek E Insaaf membership in Pakistan has now exceeded 1 Crore (10 Million) members making it the largest political party in Pakistan. This is great news for PTI and its supports but the job is only half done. We have to insure that these members turn into voters on election day. PPP won with approx. 10.5 million votes in previous election. Now add to that the massive voter fraud and we can see who can truly sweep next general election.
To put things in perspective, consider this. Karachi had more seats than any other city in the national and provincial legislatures, and a total of 6.6 million registered voters. Only 3.9 million could be verified. A glaring 2.7 million entries had been FAKE.
Similarly, Lahore, Pakistan’s second largest city and capital of most populous province Punjab, had a total of 3.7 million registered voters. Among them 2.1 million have been declared genuine and the remaining 1.6 million could not be verified.
Source: Voter fraud: 65% of votes in Balochistan were bogus – The Express Tribune
Main Source: Imran Khan (official) | Facebook
MEMBERSHIP UPDATE: Pakistan Tehreek E Insaaf membership in Pakistan has now exceeded 1 Crore (10 Million) members making it the largest political party in Pakistan. This is great news for PTI and its supports but the job is only half done. We have to insure that these members turn into voters on election day. PPP won with approx. 10.5 million votes in previous election. Now add to that the massive voter fraud and we can see who can truly sweep next general election.
To put things in perspective, consider this. Karachi had more seats than any other city in the national and provincial legislatures, and a total of 6.6 million registered voters. Only 3.9 million could be verified. A glaring 2.7 million entries had been FAKE.
Similarly, Lahore, Pakistan’s second largest city and capital of most populous province Punjab, had a total of 3.7 million registered voters. Among them 2.1 million have been declared genuine and the remaining 1.6 million could not be verified.
Source: Voter fraud: 65% of votes in Balochistan were bogus – The Express Tribune
Main Source: Imran Khan (official) | Facebook
Similar threads
