After a month of political crisis in Islamabad, Pakistan’s united opposition parties successfully removed Prime Minister Imran Khan in a vote of no confidence on April 10 and then on April 11 voted in opposition leader Shahbaz Sharif as the new prime minister. The votes came after the Supreme Court of Pakistan blocked earlier attempts by Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party government to dismiss the motion and move directly to fresh elections. Khan remains defiant despite his ouster, alleging an international conspiracy against him and denouncing his rivals and defecting party members as traitors to the country, and his followers continue to rally across the country.
Khan accused the United States of backing the no-confidence motion against him, accused his rivals of conspiring with the United States and has sought to position himself as a defender of the country’s foreign policy independence. How will Khan’s campaign impact future U.S.-Pakistan relations?
Salikuddin: Former prime minister Imran Khan tried to block the no-confidence vote against him by making the political crisis into a national security issue and cynically drawing on popular anti-imperial and anti-American sentiments. Khan’s particular brand of right-wing nationalism fuels conspiracy theories that the West, and particularly the United States,
has long been calling all the shots in Pakistan. PTI’s proclamation of an “independent foreign policy” resonates with the urban upper class and youth voters, but also got Khan in trouble with the military establishment that prefers to balance ties with both the United States and China. U.S.
policymakers see the accusations as desperate political moves and are somewhat assured by both the Supreme Court’s decision that did not call for any investigations into an alleged “foreign plot” and General Bajwa’s recent statements at the Islamabad Security Dialogue reaffirming U.S.-Pakistan ties.
