Will create new party to contest elections if PTI is banned: Imran

ISLAMABAD

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief

Imran Khan has said in the event that his party is banned, he will float a new political party to contest the upcoming general elections and will win the elections. After violent protests broke out across the country of Pakistan on 9 May and the subsequent clampdown on the protesters—many of whom were PTI sympathisers—and the party that followed, several figures in the government had called for a ban on the party. Pakistan’s Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah had said that banning the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf was “the only solution”.

Defence Minister Khawaja Asif later confirmed that a move to the same effect was being considered while the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman and Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari had also said his party would not resist any moves to impose a potential ban on the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. Questioned about the impact that a possible ban might have on his electoral future the PTI leader and former Prime Minister said, “If they remove the party then we will form a party with a new name and still win the elections.”

The former Pakistan PM was quoted saying that “even if they disqualify me and throw me in jail, the party (PTI) will still win”. The controversial political underlined that despite the upheaval, his base of supporters “remains intact” and claimed that the national politics had “fundamentally changed”. Khan has since the protests, alleged a continued crackdown on his party and has claimed that the Pakistan government is still trying to “break” the party through “intimidation.”