Opinion The Imran juggernaut
His easy-on-the-ear populism is Pakistans biggest crowd-puller
What for years was the political equivalent of a jalopy a much lampooned party that attracted snickers from pundits and indifference from voters has,in the matter of a couple of months,threatened to grow into a juggernaut.
Imran Khans mammoth rallies in Lahore on October 30 and in Karachi on December 26 have catapulted him ahead of his contemporaries in at least the crowd-pulling stakes: the only modern-era politician in Pakistan who drew comparable crowds was Benazir Bhutto,but she only managed it two decades apart in her homecomings from exile: in Lahore (1986) and Karachi (2007).
The secret to Imrans success,many suggest,is the backing of the security establishment. With his anti-US,anti-incumbency,anti-corruption mantra,Imran is the kind of politician the army wants when neither of the mainstream political options,Asif Zardaris PPP and Nawaz Sharifs PML-N,is liked by the establishment and when international pressure on Pakistan is growing because of the armys national security paradigm. Or,so Imrans critics argue.
While it seems likely that Imran does have the security establishment cheering him on,the secret to mobilising hundreds of thousands of people in two large cities is something else: a growing disillusionment with the status quo political options,powered by one of the most tumultuous periods in the countrys history.
Since 2008,when Musharrafs semi-dictatorship ended amid upheaval and recriminations,a perfect storm has swept up Pakistan and rattled it to its core. The economy is in the doldrums,cumulative inflation has been at a historic high,electricity and gas shortages are endemic,the national airline,railways and steel mills are bust,and the Pakistani rupee has lost more than a third of its value.
The security side has fared even worse: while violence is down from the peak of the Islamist insurgency in 2008-09,militant attacks are frequent enough to ensure the public remains deeply anxious. The deteriorating relations with the US,meanwhile,have whipped up nationalist sentiment.
Confronted by these epic crises,the spectacular incompetence and corruption of the PPP-led federal government and the anaemic performance of the PML-N-led Punjab government have left the public searching for alternatives.
Enter Imran and his easy-on-the-ear populism. His message is disarmingly simple,disingenuously so to critics: all Pakistan needs for a brighter future is honest leadership dedicated to public service and not personal material enrichment.
Add to that a dash of nationalism and anti-Americanism: The threat from militancy will recede once the Americans leave the region! And Imran has found a formula that has gained traction with the youth and the urban,educated middle-class that is traditionally apolitical.
The fact that Imrans Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) has not proposed a single serious policy prescription,a fact sceptical pundits mention,appears to be beside the point for the sections of the public drawn to him. The reason: Imran benefits from a comparison with the status quo.
Of President Zardari,PM Yousaf Gilani,Nawaz Sharif and Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif,none of them inspires confidence in the public with policies to alter the trajectory of the country. With the existing menu having little to offer,Imrans brand of policy-less politics doesnt appear to have hampered his rising popularity.
The real test for any politician is electoral results. Imrans core support is the youth and the urban middle class,but will they turn out in large numbers to vote on election day? And could the PTI vote be spread too thinly across the country to win more than a handful of seats?
Electoral results are notoriously difficult to predict,but were elections to be held now Imrans PTI would fall somewhere between being a spoiler for the PML-N in Punjab and a genuine third force in Pakistani politics alongside the PPP and PML-N.
Time may be on Imrans side. Unless tensions between the army and the PPP result in a sudden end to the federal governments term,elections are not expected until late 2012. The longer the period between now and elections,the more time Imran has to build a party machinery and attract electable candidates.
But a long run-in has dangers too. Most notably,the contradiction between Imrans dismissal of old politics and his bid to recruit established candidates could alienate his core support. And,for all the disillusionment with the status quo,a party with few articulated policies may fail to attract enough voters to overturn the status quo.
The writer,an assistant editor with Dawn,is based in Karachi,express@expressindia.com
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