PTI – preventing fall from grace

It was bright sunny morning on 18 August 2018 and a historical day for PTI to have won the elections and beg more seats than any other political party therefore as a matter of right PTI was invited by the care takers to form the government. After meeting the heads of various political parties PTI formed the coalition government. It was great shock for the PPP and PML N to see PTI emerging the largest party to form the government therefore as per practice in vogue both the parties decided not to accept the results and started criticising the government and propagating that the elections were rigged and called IK as selected Prime Minister and attributed his victory to establishment. It is now more than 3 years that major opposition parties are continuing their negative propaganda against the government specially targeting Prime Minister Imran Khan setting worst example of democracy. Under these circumstances PM was left with no option except to ignore the opposition as a result parliament became dysfunctional and government decided to carry on the business through the ordinances.
During election campaign PTI like other parties had made very tall promises to poor people laying emphasis to raise their living standard and pull them out of poverty and bring back $200 Billions looted by PML N and PPP leaders while they were in power. There has not been much of success as promised because the kitty was empty and the situation aggravated due to COVID-19 that resulted in major shut down of smaller industries and also some major industries resulting in more unemployment to avoid spread of pandemic. The government launched Ehsas program for the poor, shelters (Panagah) for poor were made, and housing projects for poor were announced. The speed has been certainly slow but the work has started. For young people small loan schemes were launched to create more opportunities for the educated people. Nothing was done to revive Pakistan Steel and PIA instead these were badly neglected and resulted in further deterioration. The privatisation process has been awfully slow resulting extra burden on national exchequer due to poor performance of state owned industries. A country that was already under heavy debt was left with no option except to knock the door of IMF and had to borrow money from donors and IMF under most unfavourable conditions. The government was unable to recover looted money of $ 200 billion stashed in foreign banks due to cumbersome judicial procedures. In nut shell the PTI government led by Imran Khan the Prime Minister of Pakistan failed to honour their commitments made during the election campaign. What stands out that PTI had not done its home work and was unaware about the exact position of the country. The voters were largely disappointed as none of the promise was fulfilled leaving enough space for opposition to create problems for the government. Things got worse when our rupee was devalued that brought abrupt increase in inflation that affected the economy badly resulting in more lay off and prices of items of daily use went sky rocket high forcing people to stage demonstrations and protests against the government. The government failed to control the inflation and repeated mantra of “Ghabrana Nahi”
On the international front the performance has been much better as compared to other democratic governments and credit must be given to Prime Minister for pleading Kashmir case in United Nations and educating the world on Islamophobia. But, at the same time set a very bad precedence surrendering before TLP having declared it as terrorist organisation and after their dangerous sit in blocking entire Pakistan entered into agreement to call off Dharna on conditions not disclosed to the people. He also failed miserably to control various mafias operating in the country but needs appreciation accepting it boldly. He failed to create a good team as a result he was forced to make frequent postings and transfers of Chief Secretaries and IG Police especially in Punjab. He employed weak CM’s in Punjab and KPK intentionally to run the provinces by remote control from Islamabad and paid heavily. The performance of PTI in by elections and Cantonment Board elections has been disappointing. Local Bodies elections in the first phase in KPK and PTI defeat in home shows mood of the people. These results were shocking that un nerved IK as a result he has dissolved all type of committees throughout Pakistan and appointed new people. He has done it to ensure to stop action replay in phase II of KPK and Punjab local bodies elections to be held in near future. The time will tell whether he succeeds or faces further embarrassment.
It is more than three years that IK is after Sharif’s and looks suffering from Nawaz phobia knowing full well that his fate is to be decided by the courts, had he devoted all this time on party affairs and governance it can be said in certainty they would have done much better in by and local bodies elections. Time is running fast people still want him to succeed for that he must change his line of direction and try to give relief to common failing which his dream of Nia Pakistan shall remain a dream.