Imran Khan ‘thanks’ Opposition for boosting his party’s popularity

Islamabad: Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has “thanked” the Opposition bigwigs — Shehbaz Sharif, Asif Zardari and Maulana Fazlur Rehman — for moving a no-confidence motion against him, saying it helped his party regain popularity, Express Tribune reported.

“Our estranged party workers have returned to [PTI] after seeing their [opposition leaders’] real faces… Nations fall when they stop differentiating between good and evil,” Khan said while addressing a public gathering in Punjab’s Kamalia district on Saturday.

Calling PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif a “boot polisher” and “Cherry Blossom”, the premier said that Sharif knows that if his government stays in power, he would be put behind bars due on corruption charges, Express Tribune reported.

He also lashed out at former premier and PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif, saying he had introduced horse-trading in the country’s politics.

“If he [Nawaz] returns to Pakistan, he will first attack the judiciary… He is making attempts to create rifts among the judges and he will never allow an independent judiciary to function,” Khan said.

He added that Nawaz, who has been living in London since 2019 for medical treatment, will also “target” the military after coming to power because “he wants to control all institutions” to protect himself from accountability, the report said.

Khan said political leaders with offshore assets can never pursue independent foreign policy, fearing that their wealth could be seized.

“I don’t want to strain a country’s relations with any other country but there is a difference between ‘boot polishing’ and maintaining balanced ties,” he said while referring to the Opposition’s criticism of his remarks against EU diplomats.