ISI accused of asking leaders to join Imran Khan's PTI party
ISLAMABAD: Last month, a PML-N candidate from Multan in Pakistan’s Punjab, who had accused the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) of pressuring him to switch parties, backtracked and said it was the agriculture department that had picked him up.
After his statement about pressure from the ISI went viral on social media, he told the media he had been probed by the agriculture department for two years for alleged misdoings during a past tenure there. His remarks were repeated on Tuesday at a news conference by the military spokesman, Lt Gen Asif Ghafoor.
Now the media jokes that it isn’t the intelligence agencies that are picking up candidates to ensure they change loyalties, but the “agriculture department”. Jokes aside, the manner in which the shadowy intelligence set-up has convinced many “electables”, as they are referred to, to change loyalties and join Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party is unprecedented, say observers. A report in The News daily disclosed earlier this year that “scores” of PML-N politicians, including sitting MPs and legislators, had decided to join the PTI. Many of these candidates, who enjoy a good standing in their constituencies, were reportedly promised a number of incentives for making the switch.
Ironically, the PML-N lawmaker from Lodhran, Iqbal Shah – who earlier this year scored an unexpected electoral victory over Ali Tareen, the son of top PTI leader Jahangir Tareen – has now decided to join the PTI. “It has been a systematic changing of loyalties which started from south Punjab,” concedes senior PML-N leader and former minister Ahsan Iqbal.
PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif first called those involved in pressuring his party leaders the “khalai maqlooq,” or extra-terrestrials. Now he openly accuses the ISI of engineering the outcome of the elections scheduled for July 25. Never before has a senior politician openly accused the ISI of meddling in the electoral process.
Observers say the ISI has been active in encouraging some persons to stand for elections, and others to step down.