CITY NOTES
KP CM Ali Amin Gandapur may be guilty of many things, but I’m not sure the PTI’s loss in the NA-171 by-election in Khanpur tehsil of Rahim Yar Khan district is on him.
But that’s what a PPP spokesman said at a press conference, blaming Gandapur’s speech at the PTI rally in Islamabad for having spooked the electors of that constituency, which saw a PTI independent winning by nearly 48,000 votes, but then losing by over 58,000.
It seems that the Makhdooms of Mianwali Qureshian overcame the divisions that allowed the PTI in at the general election, rather than anything Ali Amin might have said.
The constituency is close to Sindh, and the voters might have been impressed by the performance of the Murad Ali Shah government, but it is in Punjab, and whose writ is supposed to run there? The CM Punjab.
Now the CM Punjab is supposed to ensure victory for the party in all by-elections. But what if the party has no candidate? The PML(N) candidate didn’t do well at all in the general election, coming in a very distant fourth, so they didn’t bother this time.
Ali Amin disappeared after the PTI rally, and his incendiary remarks against the press, the Punjab CM and the establishment. The word out is that the establishment picked him up, but I have another view. Look, the President of Pakistan and CMLA, Gen Yahya Khan, once disappeared, and could not be traced in the Presidency from some time.
He was finally found, much to the relief of the Presidency security staff, in the backseat of a car parked in the garage, asleep. It seems that he had wandered off in the midst of his potations, climbed into the car, and fallen asleep there.
Now Ali Amin is known to be fond of his cups, and I think he was off somewhere. In fact, instead of trying to accusing the government of having kidnapped its MNAs for the constitutional amendment, the PTI would do better to ask Ali Amin if he had got them to keep him company. They could then probably be found sleeping it off on a sofa in CM House Peshawar, or even on the floor.
Ali Amin, of course, is beyond his disappearances, or his remarks. Imran has backed him fully on those, going so far as to say that anyone who wanted Ali Amin to say sorry, should get out of the party. At the same time, he said that Ali Amin might have been carried away by his own rhetoric.
Does he know where Ali Amin was talking from? Does Ali Amin know who his partners in crime are? Does Imran find Ali Amin intellectually someone he can engage with? All the discussions on quantum physics he had with Usman Buzdar, he will now have with Ali Amin? Something tells me he is really worth hearing on that subject after a few.
One subject on which I’why everyone is assaulting women, whether in Ujjain or Switzerland, while he rots in jail. I’m sure he has something to say is the rape on a footpath in Ujjain. Ujjain is not just in Modi’s India, but also in Madhya Pradesh state, which is BJP-ruled.
The attacker has been arrested. But also arrested is the rickshaw driver Saleem, who caught the incident on his mobile. Well, I suppose he’s a Muslim, so he should be arrested. But Ali Amin would probably object to the incident not getting even his permission, let alone Imran’s.
Of course, Imran is probably more concerned with Islamic scholar Tariq Ramadan’s conviction for rape in Switzerland. Ramadan is 66, but he has not taken the plea that he deserves congratulations. Imran is older than him, but is not fazed by the charge. He wants to know.
Mark my words, Ali Amin wants to be Foreign Minister in Imran’s next Cabinet, what with his declaration that he intends to talk to Afghanistan. His intention is laudable, but both his defenders and opponents seem to forget that the other side will only talk to him if they see he has the backing of the state.
Footnote to these notes: James Earl Jones has died, aged 93. He deserves credit for such roles as Othello, which was a bit of inspired casting. But he was really remembered for being the voice of Darth Vader. Ali Amin only imagines he sounds like him, though he tries hard enough.
