LAHORE - As Pakistan looks ahead to a national election later this spring, the biggest wildcard is shaping up to be cricket legend Imran Khan, who rallied at least 150,000 flag-waving supporters in the eastern city of Lahore on Saturday.After years of trying to gain a foothold in Pakistani politics, the shaggy-haired, ruggedly good-looking 60-year-old has finally elbowed his way into the big league. Casting himself as a populist anti-corruption crusader, he is seen as a threat to the two parties that have long dominated elections.
Imran has almost mythical status in cricket-crazy Pakistan. He was the captain of the national team that won the 1992 World Cup — the only time the country has claimed the sport’s highest prize — and polls show he’s the nation’s most popular politician by a wide margin.
But it’s uncertain how effective he will be in converting his personal appeal into votes for his party when Pakistan holds parliamentary elections on May 11 — the first transition between democratically elected governments in a country that has experienced three military coups.
Much of ImranÂ’s support has come from young, middle-class Pakistanis in the countryÂ’s major cities, a potentially influential group. Almost half of PakistanÂ’s more than 80 million registered voters are under the age of 35, but the key question is whether Imran can get his young supporters to show up at the polling booth.
“This is going to swing the election,” Imran told in an interview before the rally. “The youth is standing with us and change.”
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On foreign policy, he has struck a chord by criticising PakistanÂ’s unpopular alliance with the United States and controversial American drone attacks targeting Al Qaeda and Taleban militants in the countryÂ’s northwest tribal region. He also believes the Pakistani army should pull out of the tribal region, where it is fighting a domestic Taleban insurgency, and resolve the conflict through negotiations.
ImranÂ’s message has helped him rally huge crowds in PakistanÂ’s major cities.
Some people estimated that up to 200,000 people packed into the park in downtown Lahore on Saturday, despite periods of lighting and driving rain. Many of the people at the rally were middle-class youths like Wasim who danced to music blaring over loudspeakers and waved the red, white and green flag of ImranÂ’s party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or the Movement for Justice. But plenty of older Pakistanis, some of whom had switched from other parties out of frustration, also turned up.
Imran hopes the momentum from the rally will push forward what he calls his political “tsunami” and help his party win a majority of the 272 National Assembly seats that are up for election. That would allow Imran to form the next government and position him to become prime minister.
He is up against the two groups that have dominated the countryÂ’s politics for decades, the Pakistan PeopleÂ’s Party, which led the most recent government, and the main opposition party, the Pakistan Muslim League-N. Both have broad alliances with local leaders who use political
“The reason why we are in politics is to break the stranglehold of these two parties who have plundered this country,” Khan told.
Many analysts are less bullish and believe KhanÂ’s party will win 20-40 seats. They predict the PML-N, which is led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, will lead the polls and KhanÂ’s party will come in third behind the recently ruling PeopleÂ’s Party. The conventional wisdom is that no party will win a majority of the seats, and SharifÂ’s PML-N will end up having to put together a weak coalition government.
“I think third place is the safest bet for Khan’s party, but if he could gain second, which is not impossible, it would be a big political revolution for the country,” said Rasul Baksh Rais, a political science professor at Lahore University of Management Sciences.
A breakout performance by KhanÂ’s party could spell trouble for the PML-N because both parties appeal to urban, middle-class voters in Punjab. Some analysts predict that if KhanÂ’s candidates can steal away enough votes from SharifÂ’s party, they could swing the balance in favor of the PeopleÂ’s Party and allow it to once again form the next government. The PeopleÂ’s PartyÂ’s largest area of support is outside Punjab, in southern Sindh province, where Khan has less backing.
Senator Tariq Azim Khan, who runs the PML-N’s media operations, acknowledged Khan’s potential role as a “spoiler,” but claimed his party’s lead is so great after five years of “misrule” by the People’s Party that it’s unbeatable. He also painted Khan as someone who doesn’t have the experience to handle the country’s problems.
“He might have good intentions, but winning a cricket World Cup does not make you a good prime minister,” said the senator.
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He risked losing support during the past year when he was criticized for opening his party up to traditional politicians who could deliver votes but clashed with promises to change PakistanÂ’s corrupt political system. He said he addressed that criticism by holding the first intra-party elections in the countryÂ’s history, so members can recommend who runs on the partyÂ’s ticket.
One of the main reasons for the weekend rally in Lahore was to take an oath from the 80,000 newly elected party workers.