It wasn’t exactly an upset, the PTI’s sweep in the bypolls that were conducted the other day. There’s the anti-incumbency factor working against the federal government, of course, and the record inflation doesn’t quite help the ruling PDM’s case. But – this is more crucial – bypolls are traditionally won by whatever party that runs the provincial government. But this should, in no way, take away from the assessment that the former ruling party PTI is perhaps the most popular party in the country right now. Because it swept the first round of bypolls during the window that it was not running the Punjab province.
Yes, many from the ruling PDM’s ranks point out some alternative viewpoints and supporting statistics. One, that these seats were the PTI’s to lose; they were lying vacant because the party had decided to quit en masse in the aftermath of the no-confidence vote. Second, the party had fielded Imran Khan himself in these constituencies. Since the margins of victory over the otherwise nigh-decimated ANP in Peshawar and Charsadda were rather narrow, one could surmise that these seats will be lost by the party when any candidate other than Imran Khan contests them in the general elections. Narrow margins were seen also in other constituencies like Mardan. This line of reasoning is further reinforced by the loss of the party’s candidate in Multan.
In the PTI itself, however, there is an understandable sense of jubilation. The victory, predictable as it may have been, is going to serve to put aside any doubts put forth by senior party leaders to the party chairman about his current approach. It’s a shot-in-the-arm for his narrative, and it is unlikely that he will back down now.
He is reiterating his demand for early elections and that would have been the correct approach in this scenario, on that this paper has been endorsing since the very beginning of the current dispensation. But the floods have changed that equation. With around a third of the country under water, there are logistical issues to take into account, if not those of propriety.
Still, a roadmap needs to be etched out for the polls so that the chips fall where they may. These are times of political instability; going back to the people can never be a bad idea.
