WHAT does the outcome of local elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa mean for the PTI government? Does it indicate the shape of things to come for local elections elsewhere in the country and general elections little over a year away? Were only ‘local’ factors in play that may not hold in national elections? Is grassroot opinion turning against the incumbent party? Are voters, burdened by inflation, in a punishing mood across the country?

There is little doubt that the local bodies election was a stunning blow for the Imran Khan government. KP has long been PTI’s bastion of power. Few predicted it would do so poorly in a province it runs. The first phase of local government elections in 17 provincial districts saw PTI come a distant third on more than half the seats. It trailed behind JUI-F in many contests. Not only did PTI lose mayoral elections and many tehsil chairmen’s seats but its failure to win the mayor’s post in Peshawar was little short of a debacle as the party had scooped up all the national and provincial seats from the city in 2018. JUI-F’s electoral success is one of the surprising comebacks in recent Pakistani politics.

Red Zone Files: With its fortress breached, the PTI may now find itself fighting for its political survival

Prime Minister Imran Khan was quick to acknowledge the setback attributing it to mistakes that exacted a political price. In a tweet he maintained that “wrong candidate selection was the major cause” and added that for the second phase of polls, he would personally supervise PTI’s election strategy. Some ministers saw party infighting as the main reason for failure. A senior minister said, “When three to four candidates from the same party contest the polls in the same constituency, then the party will [inevitably] lose the election.” Others called for addressing the party’s “shortcomings”. Dissident PTI MNAs from KP went further and claimed they saw this coming given their party’s poor governance and failure to control inflation. They also said their warnings to the leadership were ignored as was the growing alienation of party workers.

Voters are unforgiving about what they see as lack of government performance. Skyrocketing prices especially food inflation was the key factor for rising discontent with PTI’s government as reflected in the KP electoral outcome. Acknowledged by several ministers as a principal cause this has important implications for the party’s electoral fortunes in the general election. There are other factors too. In fact, a combination of reasons lies behind its dismal performance. Weak and lacklustre provincial leadership is one. The PTI team in the province, like the one the prime minister has positioned in Punjab, has not distinguished itself for providing an effective administration or having a strong grip on the party.

A house divided against itself in times of economic discontent exacted a political cost in KP’s election.

With intense factionalism and bitter inhouse rivalries afflicting the provincial party, this led PTI candidates to work against each other in the election. Denied tickets, many party members defied party discipline to contest as independents. A house divided against itself in an environment of economic discontent produced predictable results.

Several traits the party and its leadership have acquired — laid bare by the KP polls — can be consequential for how the party fares in future elections. First, the prime minister’s inability to find time to focus on party matters, which he has now implicitly admitted. He has taken little interest over the past couple of years in managing the party. That has translated into an inability to motivate his team and keep it together. Political management hasn’t been a skill PTI leaders have learnt or honed. Nor have efforts been made to institute party discipline. This was on display in the KP election when multiple PTI candidates vied for the same seat. It is also reflected at the national level in unchecked inhouse rivalries and clashes among senior leaders that often spill over into the public domain. Ministers routinely contradict each other, often making public statements at odds with the leadership’s position. This makes for an ill-disciplined party and lack of cohesiveness. This has a political cost in elections and has contributed to the party’s defeat in successive national and provincial by-elections.

The absence of Jahangir Khan Tareen, architect of PTI’s election strategy in 2018 and a quintessential organisation man, has become more telling as time has gone by. The political vacuum he left has not been filled by any leader with the outreach capability, humility and energy that Tareen displayed, which earned him wide respect. Instead, senior PTI leaders have become increasingly disconnected from the party’s grassroot support, and spend more time projecting themselves than serving the party. A striking phenomenon is how they vanish when their government faces a crisis or challenge.

Read: Looking for a JKT

Another aspect of the party relates to weak provincial heads and uninspiring and unempowered chief ministers in KP and Punjab. They lack both political skills and the stature needed to rally, unify and strengthen the party in their provinces. Their stultifying management has already contributed to the party losing significant political ground in the two provinces. PTI’s own provincial lawmakers see these chief ministers holding office not due to any intrinsic merit or competence but because the prime minister prefers pliant figures who can be controlled from Islamabad. Such leaders at the helm put the party at a political disadvantage, as amply testified by electoral setbacks PTI has faced in both provinces and in Punjab’s cantonment board elections.

Of course, incumbency has its own disadvantages especially when the economic situation has worsened with soaring inflation, gas load-shedding and shortages of essential commodities. Economic hardship has emerged as the single most important reason for growing public disaffection with the PTI government. Little improvement in the economic situation is expected in the near term. In this challenging environment, the prime minister will have to do more than personally supervise the campaign for crucial local bodies elections in Punjab and the second phase of local polls in KP. With general elections also approaching PTI needs an entire organisational overhaul, change in provincial leaderships and a course correction that above all includes crafting a credible message about its future purpose in governance. Without that the party may be over sooner than its leaders think.

The writer is a former ambassador to the US, UK & UN.

Published in Dawn, December 27th, 2021