Technocrat govt ‘idea’ frays PTI nerves

Imran says he does not see general elections happening anytime soon in the country

LAHORE:

Former premier and PTI Chairman Imran Khan on Wednesday expressed “fear” over discussions of bringing in a technocrat government in the country, saying he did not see fresh elections happening anytime soon, and noted that “people pulling the strings behind the scenes needed to agree” rather than the government to hold the polls.

The PTI chief’s remarks came after former FBR chairman Shabbar Zaidi in an interview with a private news channel on Tuesday maintained that talks were underway regarding the installation of a “caretaker government” – comprising experts – that could replace the existing PML-N coalition setup given the current economic turmoil.

The recent statement by Imran seems to be a “U-turn” from his current stance wherein he had maintained that he saw elections being held in March and April next year, and also directed his party to prepare for campaigning across the country.

Talking to a delegation of newly-elected officer-bearers of the Lahore Press Club on Wednesday, the PTI chairman said that for elections to happen, people pulling the strings behind the scene needed to agree rather than the government to hold the polls.

"The results will not be good if some sort of political engineering is done during the elections," he warned and added that the mandate of the largest party in the then East Pakistan (Bangladesh) was not recognised in 1970.

The former premier said that he was not in contact with the establishment at the moment and castigated the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) for becoming a “drawing room party”.

He again censured former army chief General (retd) Qamar Javed Bajwa and held him responsible for the current economic crises in the country.

"General (retd) Bajwa did great injustice to this country. Our government had good working relations with him but corruption of politicians was of no substance to him," he added.

To a question regarding dialogue with the government, Imran said that the interests of PML-N and PPP were abroad and did not align with Pakistan.

"When the interests of both the families – Sharifs and Zardaris – do not align with Pakistan, how can we agree on charter of democracy with them," he asked.
Imran said corruption cases worth Rs1,100 billion against the current rulers had been eliminated by amending the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) law.

"Pakistan's problems cannot be solved without establishing the rule of law," he said.

On the country's economic situation, he said that Pakistan was on the verge of default. "During our government's tenure, the risk of default was only six per cent which has increased to 90 per cent now," he added.

“The country’s problems cannot be solved without establishing the rule of law.”
PTI Senior Vice President Fawad Chaudhary also expressed a similar concern, saying his party would not accept the idea of forming a technocrat government in the country and will strongly resist it.

“We will fully condemn [the idea of] a technocrat government. We will fully condemn going out of the Constitution. Under any circumstances, a system beyond the Constitution is not acceptable to us. Political parties should also focus on this,” he said while talking to media in Islamabad.

The PTI leader termed the idea of replacing the government with a technocrat setup as “foolish”, adding that political crisis was “more severe” than the economic crises.

“Such schemes are being designed at the cost of the country’s interests just to stop Imran Khan from regaining power,” he said.

Speaking hypothetically, he noted, “You will import a technocrat from the US and have him sit here; he will take a decision [then] there will be criticism [and] rallies against it, [after which] he will leave his shoes here and run away,”

Fawad underlined that general elections was the “best solution”, saying that if the government falls, the Constitution had a solution.

He observed that it was a “straightforward matter” as the Constitution provided a “clearly and precisely written political skeleton for Pakistan”.

The PTI stalwart maintained that the idea of “importing a technocrat from the US or somewhere” was a result of the “failure of [Prime Minister] Shehbaz Sharif’s government”.

Meanwhile, the PTI chairman tasked former Punjab chief minister Sardar Usman Buzdar to ensure the presence of all 178 members of the provincial assembly for a joint session of the PTI and PML-Q parliamentary parties.

He indicated that he had already directed PML-Q leader Moonis Elahi to ensure the availability of his party’s 10 MPAs.

The meeting of the joint parliamentary parties is scheduled to be held on January 2. It will chalk out a strategy for the success of the chief minister’s vote of confidence and the date of the assembly session on which voting will be held.

Separately, while speaking to media, former federal minister and PTI Central Punjab General Secretary Hammad Azhar said the economy could be put back on track by making right decisions and ensuring political stability in the country.

He noted that a “blue-eyed lot” had been imposed in the country through a “planned conspiracy”.

“Experiment of PDM imposition has badly failed,” he said.

He said that the “fear of defeat” had forced the PDM rulers to “escape even from even councillors’ elections in the capital”.

“The ‘imported rulers’ have no strategy to deal with the current economic chaos,” Hammad said.