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Monday 23 January 2012

We would happily sit on opposition benches: Imran

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan says he is happy to go into the opposition if his “tsunami” of popular support fails to bring him a landslide victory at elections, now widely expected within months.

“The ‘tsunami’ is ready. We will be ready. Obviously it suits our party... if this government goes for another six months,” he said.”We would happily go into the opposition if we can’t form a government because basically it’s a battle between forces of status quo and forces of change,” Imran Khan told AFP.

“I think it’s the endgame because the government — it’s been openly defying the Supreme Court,” he said, adding: “I don’t think the Supreme Court is going to back down. They’ve called the prime minister dishonest so really in any decent democracy he should have resigned by now and then asked to go back to the people.”

The PTI chief further stated: “No one wants martial law in this country, none of us want it. I think the time for martial law is over in Pakistan.”

Imran Khan insists his relationship with the generals is a “sensible” one that would put him clearly in charge should his party sweep to power. “If I’m the prime minister, if I have the responsibility, I have the authority,” he said. Imran rules out forming a coalition with any of the “status quo” parties he considers venal and corrupt. Instead he is confident that his prescription for Pakistan — unbuckling the country from the war on terror alliance with the United States by refusing foreign aid and launching a massive austerity drive, will succeed.

But political commentators say Imran’s vision of a united Pakistan free from mafia and liberated from foreign influence is a pipe dream playing to a receptive crowd as the country faces renewed political uncertainty. Journalist Najam Sethi said Imran Khan’s message feeds the mindset of the majority of disaffected lower middle class Pakistani voters.


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