How Imran poses a threat to dialogue process

ISLAMABAD: The continuation of the ongoing dialogue process between the government and PTI will be in serious doubt if Imran Khan does not stop issuing “aggressive” statements.

Khan’s latest statement, attacking the prime minister as well as the army chief, has already dented the dialogue process. Not only does the government side but some leaders within the PTI also have reservations regarding Imran Khan’s social media posts and the statement issued after the initiation of talks between the two sides.

Senator Irfan Siddiqui, the spokesman for the government’s negotiating team, when approached said that Khan’s statement has already hurt the dialogue process. He wondered if the dialogue process and such hostile statements from the PTI founder chairman can go together.

Siddiqui said that the PTI’s negotiating team needs to explain why such a statement has been issued by Imran Khan after entering into the dialogue process with the government.

He asked how the PTI would respond if such a statement is issued during the dialogue process against Imran Khan by any of the top leaders (Mian Nawaz Sharif, Shehbaz Sharif, Asif Ali Zardari, Bilawal Bhutto) of the ruling PMLN and its allies.

Interestingly, some PTI top leaders are also upset with the handling of Imran Khan’s and PTI’s social media accounts. These leaders are more upset with Imran Khan’s continuing attack on the military leadership and propaganda by the party’s social media.

There is a realisation among such PTI leaders that neither any dialogue process can succeed nor will the party get its political space if Imran Khan does not stop targeting the army’s top command.

The PTI sources said that some of the leaders in the past had even raised this issue with Imran Khan and advised him to let a team of PTI leaders handle his (Imran Khan) and party’s official social media accounts. But Imran Khan gave no positive response.

Recently, Fawad Chaudhry, who had met Khan in Adiala jail, said that he told Imran Khan that the PTI needs to focus on issues instead of persons and bring down tensions with the army and its top command to get a fair space in politics.

Chaudhry said that he also asked Imran Khan to bring back the control of his “X” (formerly Twitter) account to Pakistan from abroad to lower the tension between the party and the establishment. Imran Khan’s “X” account is being used to attack the military establishment, including the army chief.