Party confusion

The PTI continues to display a level of political confusion that not only weakens its own credibility but also raises questions about its internal coherence. The most recent example? The confusion around a planned protest outside the Pakistani Embassy in Washington, DC on June 14. Is the PTI now just a party caught between competing narratives, divided leadership and a crisis of strategy? Just a day after PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan publicly distanced the party from the protest – suggesting it was the work of individual supporters in the US – the official PTI account on X (formerly Twitter) posted a promotional tweet endorsing the demonstration. The tweet claimed that “PTI USA, in collaboration with the Pakistani diaspora, is organizing a major demonstration in Washington, DC, to protest against the #UndeclaredMartialLaw in Pakistan.” This complete disconnect between the party leadership in Pakistan and its overseas wing points to deeper dysfunction within the PTI’s organisational structure.

That the protest is being staged during the US Army’s massive 250th anniversary parade – an event reportedly being attended by COAS General Asim Munir – adds to the political spectacle. But instead of presenting a united front, the PTI appears to be working at cross purposes: while its international chapter is mobilising to embarrass Pakistan on foreign soil, its chairman at home is trying to play it safe. This contradiction undermines the party’s messaging and further alienates it from the very establishment it must engage with if it wishes to return to power. Imran’s sister Aleema Khan has said she does not see her brother being released anytime soon, and has urged the party to decide how it plans to secure his freedom. But here again, the PTI’s approach seems scattered. It has announced a countrywide protest movement, but there are no signs of the kind of street power the party once commanded. After the violence of May 9, 2023, and what happened in November last year, there appears to be a lingering reluctance, both among supporters and the leadership, to push for mass mobilisation that might spiral out of control.

Political observers believe the PTI is facing a moment of reckoning. Some within the party think pressure from international protests will force the establishment’s hand. But the reality is that the military has regained much of its lost ground in the public imagination, particularly after recent regional developments. The PTI, meanwhile, appears politically adrift – popular among its core base perhaps, but increasingly irrelevant in electoral and institutional politics. The party needs to recalibrate its approach. If it continues to send mixed signals – denouncing protests one day and promoting them the next – it risks becoming a party not of resistance but of irrelevance. What it needs to do on an emergency basis now it to first put its own house in order. Confusion and contradiction masked as strategy will only deepen the crisis.