The PTI’s now-or-never rally seems to have ended. The party says that eight party workers were killed in the clashes that led to the clearing of D-chowk in Islamabad of protesters, and since it is not a military or armed organisation, it is calling off the protest. However, KP CM Ali Amin Gandapur apparently begs to differ. He says the protests are on, and will not be over till PTI founder Imran Khan says it is. This he said though the Islamabad police claimed that it had cleared the city and arrested 954 people. Mr Gandapur made this claim at a press conference on Wednesday, when he resurfaced after disappearing from D-Chowk before it was cleared by the police. His disappearance at a crucial time was noticed, as was that of some key leaders entirely. Leaders from Punjab explained that the police presence was too heavy for any movement.
There is a general head-scratching in PTI circles, and the development of a blame game is palpable. The debate on the failure to move the rally to Sangjiani, and the rising clamour that Mr Gandapur and Mr Khan’s wife, Bushra Bibi, are to blame, is dangerous for Mr Khan, for while Mr Gandapur might not mean much to him, his wife is supposed to be like Caesar’s, above suspicion, and thus any criticism of her, is taken as criticism of him. However, from all the blame flying around, no plan of action is emerging. Simply pretending the protest has not been crushed provides no guidance to the many supporters of the PTI. Perhaps the original error was to say that this was a ‘last call.’ The PTI saddled itself with the need for an explanation in addition to deciding what to do next.
That will be difficult to do. There is the question of what to do about the May 9 attacks. As D-Chowk was cleared, in Lahore an anti-terrorist court rejected Mr Khan’s bail applications in eight cases related to those attacks. The government seems determined not to be gracious in victory, but to put the boot in. Information Minister Ata Tarar has said that the protest was a missed call rather than a last call, while Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that something had to be done to prevent such further protests. The government is in danger of falling into the same all-or-nothing which has brought the PTI to its present pass.
