A PLAUSIBLE reading of the 10-month performance of Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf government reveals the fact that it’s not only the common man who has now begun to feel alienated about his rule; even his ardent admirers seem to be raising their eyebrows.

Such sense of alienation bear’s not a good omen for the country and may eventually boil over to something undesirable for the polity’s future. Some of the reasons for the prevalent skepticism are the spiraling cost of living, surging ranks of the unemployed, and certain tall but unachievable assertions. The rest is a burden of history: absence of rule of law, scourge of corruption, income disparities, energy crisis, and an intolerant and polarised society.

Some of the criticism hurled at Mr Khan is absurd and frivolous like mocking at his lack of sartorial aesthetics. This does not count much. Today, nobody remembers the third president of the United States, Thomas Jefferson, for greeting his ambassadors and foreign dignitaries in his pajamas. History chiefly remembers him for drafting the declaration of independence, establishing the principle of religious freedom, and separating the church from the state. Similarly, the main yardstick for measuring Mr Khan’s legacy will be how often he looks into the mirror of his performance and constantly reviews it.

Secondly, our Prime Minister should shun his naive and egoistical approach towards statecraft and instead focus on team-building and organisation. Pakistan has already suffered more irretrievably at the hands of its amateur politicians than anything else.

Inayat Atta

Dera Ismail Khan

Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2019