Bribing Imran?

Imran Khan certainly has a flair for the dramatic. Speaking at what should have been an apolitical ceremony at the Shaukat Khanum hospital in Peshawar on Tuesday, the PTI chief made the stunning allegation that he had been offered Rs10 billion to keep quiet about the Panama Papers leaks. He did not say who exactly had proffered the bribe, although the implication was clear, and neither did he give any details about when it was offered. Naturally, the PML-N rubbished the allegations but even the PPP – which is also trying to remove Nawaz Sharif from power – said proof was needed or at least a name given for Imran to be taken seriously. It was left to PTI officials to try and extricate Imran from the hole he had dug for himself but they only ended up making matters worse. The story given by party members was that a close mutual friend of Shahbaz Sharif and Imran Khan approached Imran about two weeks ago and happened to mention, by the by, that the Sharif family was willing to pay Rs10 billion for this silence.

The story doesn’t add up. If the Sharifs were so terrified by Imran’s speeches and rallies that they were willing to part with a large fortune just to keep him quiet, why was it only casually brought up so late in the game, when the Supreme Court had already heard the case? And why would anyone who is supposedly a close friend of Imran’s think he could be bought at any price? This tactic comes straight from the tired Imran playbook. He says something explosive that always ends up having less to it than meets the eye. Think of his 35 punctures allegations, which he would claim he had heard from somewhere, without giving any details. Or the countless times he has maligned every institution in the country, from the Supreme Court to the Election Commission of Pakistan to the media for being part of a conspiracy to rig the election against him. The allegations levelled by Imran are too serious for him to play out the I-heard-it-from-a-friend-of-a-friend routine. Imran has now been in politics long enough to learn that power and popularity need to be accompanied by responsibility.