{"id":37518,"date":"2024-02-10T05:12:10","date_gmt":"2024-02-10T05:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=37518"},"modified":"2024-02-10T05:12:14","modified_gmt":"2024-02-10T05:12:14","slug":"pakistan-elections-against-the-odds-khans-pti-proves-support-is-solid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=37518","title":{"rendered":"Pakistan elections: Against the odds, Khan’s PTI proves support is solid"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BBC News: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today’s results are both clear and complicated.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Independent candidates – many of whom would have run under the banner of the PTI party but were prevented from doing so – have taken the largest number of seats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However the PML-N, led by pre-election frontrunner Nawaz Sharif, can currently claim to be the largest party.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is clear is that Imran Khan’s PTI party has proved that its popularity is not a social media bubble, but has a real and committed support base.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It came into this election with its founder disqualified and in prison (he is already serving a three-year sentence for corruption, and has been handed further jail terms in recent weeks)<\/a>, and its cricket bat symbol removed from the ballot – an electoral blow in a country with low literacy rates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Khan, who was ousted as prime minister by his opponents in 2022, has said the numerous cases against him are politically motivated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Forced to run as independents, PTI’s candidates were unable to hold large rallies, with some candidates in jail, and others in hiding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The party says that its supporters have been intimidated and picked up by the police while it tries to run its campaign – allegations the authorities have always denied.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite all of that, PTI-linked candidates appear to have won more seats than any other group.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BBC News: Today’s results are both clear and complicated. Independent candidates – many of whom would have run under the banner of the PTI party but were prevented from doing so – have taken the largest number of seats. However the PML-N, led by pre-election frontrunner Nawaz Sharif, can currently claim to be the largest party. What is clear is that Imran Khan’s PTI party has proved that its popularity is not a social media bubble, but has a real and committed support base. It came into this election with its founder disqualified and in prison (he is already serving… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":37519,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-37518","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37518","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=37518"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37518\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":37520,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37518\/revisions\/37520"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=37518"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=37518"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=37518"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}