Winners and losers: Imran Khan and Nawaz Sharif on Pakistan’s democracy
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‘Just one week before the February 8 legislative elections , former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan received consecutive prison terms in two separate instances. This illustrates how the roles in Pakistan’s complex political system, which is controlled by the establishment’s shadowy hands, have shifted. The opposition Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the Pakistan People’s Party had accused the military of electoral manipulation in favor of the former cricket star, who was the generals’ favorite candidate, when Mr. Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was voted to power in 2018. A year prior, the PML-N chief, Nawaz Sharif, was forced to step down as prime minister due to charges involving the Panama Papers. He was ultimately found guilty and stripped of his official position, forcing him into exile.
Mr. Sharif is back running the PML-N, while Mr. Khan has been disqualified and is serving lengthy terms. There was little surprise in the judicial processes and the findings, considering the manner in which Mr. Khan and his party were pursued by the military and other state institutions. In the so-called “Cipher case,” he was sentenced to 10 years by a special court on Tuesday for allegedly leaking state secrets. On Wednesday, he and his spouse were given 14 years in prison in the Toshakhana case for allegedly keeping some of the gifts they had received while he was in office.
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‘In April 2022, Mr. Khan was compelled to resign from office due to disagreements with the military establishment. At a gathering, he held a document that seemed to be a diplomatic cable issued by the Pakistani ambassador to the United States in 2022. He claimed that the military and the US were plotting to remove him, and this was later revealed to be a breach of the Official Secrets Act. His counsel claim that Mr. Khan was denied the opportunity to provide a suitable defense during the “Cipher” trial, which was held inside a jail, and that they were replaced by state attorneys in the middle of the case . Protests on a grand scale ensued after his May arrest.
However, the PTI has been the target of a concerted campaign by the government to undermine it; as a result , several of its leaders are in jail and others have either fled or are on the run . The party was recently prohibited by a judge from using its famous cricket bat emblem on ballots. Numerous PTI employees are running as independents . The elections appear to be rigged while Mr. Sharif appears to be winning the backing of the unseen power center in the electoral arena, while Mr. Khan is incarcerated and his party is in shambles due to state brutality. While Mr. Sharif may mount a political comeback, the military and the nation’s democracy stand to gain and lose respectively from the current events in Pakistan, which is facing severe economic difficulties.
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