By Shakir Husain<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NEW DELHI, July 18 (NNN-Bernama) — Former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) swept the Punjab provincial assembly by-elections on Sunday, underscoring his popularity as a mass leader.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The PTI won 15 of the 20 seats up for grabs in the byelection, while its main rival Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif secured four seats and one went to an independent candidate, according to unofficial results published by the Pakistani media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
PML-N leaders conceded defeat as the PTI took an unassailable lead during the vote count on Sunday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The seats had fallen vacant after the disqualification of PTI members who had voted against the party in a controversial assembly vote in April in which Shehbaz\u2019s son Hamza Shehbaz was elected Punjab’s chief minister.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The PTI’s emphatic win raises its strength in the provincial assembly and makes Hamza’s position untenable as his government is without a simple majority.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Imran’s election rallies had drawn massive crowds and throughout this campaign he accused the PML-N and its allies of being part of an alleged United States-engineered regime change operation in Pakistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Days before his party lost power in Punjab, the most populous and politically important province, Imran was ousted as prime minister on the night of April 9 via a no-confidence vote in the National Assembly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The former prime minister has been calling for snap national elections for months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Throughout his election campaign, Imran focused on his fight for Pakistan’s “real freedom” and sovereignty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The message resonated with the masses, who are also upset at rising inflation and a lack of business and employment opportunities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Imran said “our PTI workers and voters of Punjab” defeated not only the PML-N but also the “entire state machinery” and “a totally biased” Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The only way forward from here is to hold fair and free (national) elections under a credible ECP. Any other path will only lead to greater political uncertainty and further economic chaos,” he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The PTI\u2019s bypoll victory also shatters the notion of Punjab being a stronghold of the Sharif family headed by Shehbaz’s brother and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, who lives in self-exile in London.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Pakistani analysts and journalists said the results proved Imran’s mass appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“More than July 25, 2018, it is today that Imran Khan has arrived as a genuinely popular political leader in Pakistan with grassroots support. Hard to see what stands in his way from here on,” journalist Khurram Husain said, making a reference to the 2018 national election in which the PTI was the single largest party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
— NNN-BERNAMA<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Shakir Husain NEW DELHI, July 18 (NNN-Bernama) — Former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) swept the Punjab provincial assembly by-elections on Sunday, underscoring his popularity as a mass leader. The PTI won 15 of the 20 seats up for grabs in the byelection, while its main rival Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":183994,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[215,288,194],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183992"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=183992"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":183995,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183992\/revisions\/183995"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/183994"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=183992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=183992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=183992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}