by OMAR WARAICH
He has become Pakistan’s most popular politician, but he has as many enemies as friends
Some years ago, on a visit to London, Imran Khan was confronted about his spacious property outside Islamabad. How does it behove the former cricket legend to speak of Pakistan’s poor, a student demanded to know, when he lives in “a palace”? “Don’t you dare call it a palace,” Khan snapped back, in mock outrage. “It’s paradise.”
The prized hacienda is on a hilltop. Manicured lawns sweep around the red clay-roofed, golden ochre-walled home. Inside, rooms are airy and lightly appointed. Vaulted ceilings encase a tasteful mix of stiff wooden chairs and soft white sofas.
The view, at least, is plausibly Elysian. During the day the sun splashes over the Himalayan foothills in the background, and shimmers on the nearby lake. But Khan now covets a different home. Faintly visible in the distance, down in the direction of the capital, lies the Prime Minister’s residence.
“We’ll win the next election,” Khan insists, in characteristically self-assured tones. “There’s going to be a very strong movement behind us. I can already sense it.” With the prospect of elections as soon as April, he is already busy courting votes. Indeed, his “overthrow the government, save the country” campaign is agitating for a snap poll.
The optimism, he says, is not misplaced. After years in the political wilderness, a flurry of polls say the country’s most popular cricketer is now its most popular politician. Last month a Pew survey showed 68 per cent of people view Khan favourably – five points ahead of his closest rival.
In the industrial town of Faisalabad last month, Imran Khan drew a mostly young crowd of some 35,000 people. The voters he’s targeting are under 30, in a country where the median age is just 21. And women.
At a recent Islamabad protest, two-toned heels clattered alongside young men’s trainers. “The women are watching political talk shows now,” says Khan, a regular guest on cable news channels, “they’re more popular than soap operas.” Columnist Ayesha Tammy Haq calls it the “weak in the knees club”. If Imran Khan capitalises on that, she adds, he could get half the vote.
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