Following his meeting with the founder of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Imran Khan yesterday, a beaming PTI chairman Barrister Khan explained his party’s post-election strategy loudly and clearly. According to him, his party’s mandate was “stolen” on Feb 8, claiming that PTI-backed candidates had returned successful on as many as 180 seats as people gave them a mandate, ‘which is unprecedented in the entire history of the country’.

Flanked by two senior lawyers who too belong to PTI, Ali Zafar and Hamid Ali Khan, Barrister Gohar also told media persons that the party founder, Imran Khan, had asked him to reach out to all political parties, except Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-), Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), in order to form a coalition government at the Centre.

Be that as it may, the country is now in the throes of growing uncertainty mainly because of the fact that people have thrown up a woefully polarized mandate through the Feb 8 general elections. If one goes by the media reports, the parties that finished first, second and third in the election fray—PML-N, PPP and MQM, respectively— have already done the required arithmetic to form a governments at the centre and in at least two provinces, Punjab and Sindh. Unfortunately, the situation is exceedingly tense, to say the least.

The polarization of the electorate into pro-PTI and pro-rest of the parties can clearly be seen across the country, particularly in Punjab, the country’s largest province in terms of population and the number of seats of National Assembly. Unfortunately, the question what is actually in store for the country has no easy answer at this point in time.

Deepening political uncertainty in the country has begun to batter an already beleaguered economy. The situation requires all the warring political parties to articulate their responses to the situation keeping in view the overall interest of the country for nothing could be more important, greater or sacrosanct than the national interest.

And what actually constitutes the national interest are a sovereign state’s goals and ambitions in the areas of economy, military, diplomacy, culture, etc. In my view, it is about time all the parties buried the hatchet in the larger national interest.

Saleem Raza

Karachi

Copyright Business Recorder, 2024