Technical knockout?

EDITORIAL: As things stand, it’s not just the events leading up to the Toshakhana verdict and Imran Khan’s arrest, but also those stemming from it that need very careful analysis.

Whether or not the case could have gone another way if Khan’s legal team had contested it on merit over the course of 40 long hearings instead of obsessing with technical matters like maintainability and alleged bias of the judge, etc., is now irrelevant. In its immediate response PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) is fussing that the conviction was reserved without hearing the concluding arguments of the defence counsel and that it was announced in the defendant’s absence.

Yet while it is the duty of the accused to present themselves in court, not for the court to wait for them, the law is still bound to either ensure their presence or declare them fugitives/offenders before taking any further action. That it still went ahead and declared the verdict, and the police stood so ready to pounce on Khan as soon as it was delivered, betrays an extraordinary haste that PTI will no doubt revolve its appeal around.

Perhaps its legal team realised that Khan had not been entirely forthcoming in the information provided about Toshakhana gifts, and that ECP (Election Commission of Pakistan) had presented watertight evidence, that it deliberately played this card. Khan cared to attend only three out of the 40 hearings, after all, and his lawyers did not appear for the final argument despite causing repeated delays in the court’s schedule. Time will tell.

Now, as the appeal makes its way to the superior courts, the overarching national narrative is bound to experience a tragic sense of déjà vu. It wasn’t too long ago that Nawaz Sharif, of no further use to the so-called establishment that created him and made him 3-time prime minister, was suddenly tried, jailed, disqualified and vilified, over a frivolous, even nonsensical charge, and the courts delivered the technical knockout.

Then the opposition, spearheaded by PTI, chose to celebrate even as the entire nation understood the script. Fast forward a few years and Imran’s compelling rise, widely accepted to be fuelled by the same establishment, got the wind knocked out of it rather quickly and his bitter reaction, full of threats and accusations against “dirty Harry”, “Mr X” and “Mr Y”, and a near open revolt against the powerful military, has only resulted in a rapid disintegration of his party and possibly his politics as well.

And once again it was the legal system that delivered the knockout punch to a former PM. For he too, as of now, stands jailed and disqualified and PML-N (Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz) supporters, just as unwisely as PTI’s in the last electoral cycle, are distributing sweets in the streets. The shoe is now on the other foot.

Another debate that this business has already triggered is that it is always politicians that suffer this fate in this Islamic republic. Imran might not have to spend too much time in his C-class cell in Attock jail – different from Attock fort where former president Pervez Musharraf had former prime minister Nawaz Sharif put away before the exile to Jeddah – because the charges against him, just like those that troubled former PMs Hussain Shaheed Suharwardy, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto, Nawaz Sharif, Yousaf Gilani and Shahid Khaqan, are not likely to stand up to serious scrutiny.

He crossed the line, no doubt, but the way in which the hammer is being made to drop on him gives the impression that other issues are at play.

Meanwhile, the political situation of the country hasn’t become any less confusing. The CCI (Council of Common Interests) has just ratified the latest census, which makes it certain, for all intents and purposes, that the general election will not be held on time; just as far too many stakeholders had been fearing all along.

And though Imran’s fate as the leader of the country’s largest political party has been dealt a blow, it will really be decided by higher courts just as the country goes into a temporary caretaker setup that will most certainly violate the constitution by overstaying its stipulated 90-day welcome, just as two provincial governments have been doing all this time.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023