In April 2022, Khan was ousted from power after losing no-confidence vote in the Parliament.
Initially, he gained popularity and public support as he carried with him the narrative of regime change conspiracy. However, with time passing by and Khan’s demands of early elections, failing to pressure the Shehbaz Sharif led coalition government to surrender, and his change of stance of directly accusing the US of masterminding the regime change in Pakistan; all is not well for him and his anti-government movement. <br> <br>Khan had alleged that the US was angry with him for refusing to give military bases and support for their operations in Afghanistan, which triggered by his visit to Moscow on the day when Russia invaded Ukraine.
“Imran Khan initially claimed that his government was toppled by the US support to his opposition parties. Later, he backtracked from that stance and said that US has no role in ousting him. Then he stated that it was the then army chief who backstabbed him and facilitated his ouster. Later, that claim also lost its impact because ultimately and logically speaking, former army chief Bajwa was the same person who brought Imran Khan into power in the first place”, said Adnan Shauqat, a political analyst.
“Imran Khan’s assessment has proven to be wrong and ill-managed in time. He claimed that he would create enough public pressure to force early election. That didn’t happen. He then threatened to dissolve two of his party’s controlled provincial assemblies of Punjab and KP (Khyber Pukhtunkhwa) thinking that the threat would compel the federal govt to go for early elections. Instead, Khan ended up in dissolving his own assemblies and losing more power by his wrong decision”, he added.
Analysts also say that the reason why Khan’s narrative and his political relevance has lost its steam is because his tall claims and criticism against the military establishment do not stand ground for too long. It is a known fact and confessed by Khan himself that he had meeting with the then Army Chief Qamar Javed Bajwa at the time when he was publicly slamming the same establishment for committing a crime by ousting his government.
Khan’s various campaigns from his anti-government long march, recently “failed” Jail Bharo Tehreek (Fill the Jails), initial rendering of mass resignations from the parliament and later demanding cancellations of his party member’s resignations, accusing the US and military establishment for regime change conspiracy and later taking out the US and stating that he intends to seek military establishment intervention in political affairs.. are some of the many reasons why his anti-government narrative not only lost its steam, but now banks directly on the incompetence of governance of the sitting government.
Experts say that Khan’s popularity was initially due to his narrative. However, today, his relevance is dependent on the “failures” of the current government, inflation and their struggle, which Khan uses to show himself as the less evil or the better option from the lot.
–IANS
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