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What Forced Imran Khan to Choose New Party Chief?

© AP Photo / Anjum NaveedPakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan, center, is escorted by police officers as he arrives to appear in a court, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Friday, May 12, 2023.
Pakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan, center, is escorted by police officers as he arrives to appear in a court, in Islamabad, Pakistan, Friday, May 12, 2023. - Sputnik India, 1920, 30.11.2023
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Embroiled in legal battles, ex-Prime Minister Imran Khan has made way for his aide as the new party chief. Sputnik India explores what this means for the poll-bound nation.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief and ousted ex-Prime Minister Imran Khan recently chose to hand over the mantle of his party to barrister Gohar Khan from the Rawalpindi-located Adiala Jail.
The unexpected move surprised many people as it came just ahead of February 8 National Assembly elections. Sputnik India tried to understand the possible circumstances prompting the step and its likely impact on Pakistani politics.
According to South Asian Studies expert Dr Sanjay K. Bhardwaj, Imran Khan has become a first political leader who mobilized the masses, and is also a first politician that has become a whistle-blower against the establishment, the army.
He explained to Sputnik India that though Khan was an army’s man initially, later on he started taking his own decisions particularly on the issue of international relations.
While Americans were not very happy with Khan and his visit to Russia, those sorts of domestic and international issues clubbed together, and the army became hostile to him, the Jawaharlal Nehru University professor stated.

'The PTI chief, the expert reminisced, was convicted as has been the tradition in Pakistan that whenever the army loses faith in any of the blue-eyed boys, the army convicts them in corruption, in inefficiency or whatever. The same was done against Nawaz Sharif," Dr Bhardwaj said.

"Today the Islamabad High Court has also revoked Nawaz's conviction,” he pointed out.

Well-Thought Out Move

"I feel pushing his confidante and a barrister as the next party chief seems a smart move to win support of the lawyers’ fraternity as well as judiciary", stated the geopolitical expert.
"That would help Imran Khan also to get an opportunity to come out, and to get a bailout from these cases related to him."

Struggle to Remain Politically Relevant

Imran Khan also perhaps assessed that the army and establishment will try their best to disqualify him from contesting the elections and to prevent him from leading the party, they will keep him behind the bars, he observed.

The expert believes that the PTI chief seems to have sensed that until his party is in a [powerful] position, he will not be able to give a good fight to the system, to the establishment. "Therefore, he has picked one person who can become a face for the Khan’s PTI, and has a clear image."

Imran Khan Ready for Future With New Friends in Toe

The academic finds Imran Khan fighting against the forces who had also been instrumental in assassination of Benazir Bhutto, a former PM and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader.
"Thus, there could be a conversion of interest so that they (Khan's PTI and Bilawal Bhutto's PPP) can come together. And Imran Khan wants to remain in the political frame so that he can sustain and create a resistance against the establishment," he stated.
Pakistan's former Prime Minister Imran Khan arrives to sign documents as he submits surety bond over his bails in different cases at an office of Lahore High Court in Lahore, Pakistan - Sputnik India, 1920, 21.11.2023
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