The government on Wednesday extended another invitation to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) to negotiate and end the sit-ins plaguing the country. The offer is unlikely to work and the government probably knows this, but leaving the door open for a face saving exit for them is the rational thing to do. With the protest in Islamabad resembling a school funfair rather than a political agitation, the PTI and PAT appear to be parting ways as they take their protests nationwide. Tahirul Qadri said his party will begin a nationwide agitation after Eid while Imran Khan has staged rallies in Karachi, Lahore and Mianwali. The wisdom of trying to force a government to resign by making several thousand people camp outside parliament was questionable to begin with, but wisdom is not one of Imran Khan’s virtues and the PTI is bound by his will. As former PTI President Javed Hashmi said, “Imran wants to bury the PTI” with “undemocratic behaviour”. His autocratic tendencies were known from his cricketing days, and his sense of entitlement was epitomised when he eulogised himself after the Pakistani team won the 1992 Cricket World Cup. “I am the party,” does not seem a far fetched statement for him to make. The anger among PTI parliamentarians about being forced to resign their National Assembly seats shows that while he pays lip service to democracy, Imran does not countenance dissent within his party. It is impossible to see how an autocrat intends to bring “real democracy” to Pakistan. “Real democracy” appears very similar to ‘unreal’ democracy. PTI demands do not encompass widespread reform or revolutionary idealism; they simply want to be in charge of the current government establishment and appear willing to sleep in any bed to get there. If there was any doubt about this, Javed Hashmi put it to rest when he told parliament that Imran is acting on dictation to bring down the democratic system through sustained agitation. Whose dictation is easy to guess. Ideally the government would resign after being undermined. However, no one, including the government, anticipated the unprecedented unity in parliament across party lines in support of the incumbents. In the nineties it was difficult to imagine using the word ‘mature’ to describe PPP and PML-N politics, which gives us an idea of how relativity is such a wondrous thing. Compared to the PTI, both look like elder statesmen. Nawaz Sharif seems sane compared to Imran Khan. Tragically, many people remain spellbound by Imran’s litany of falsehoods. He has tapped a deep reservoir of unresolved anger that extends from decades of misrule and directed it at the incumbent government. For example, on Wednesday he claimed the government took $ 52 billion in loans this year. Since Pakistan’s total external debt over 50 years is $ 65 billion, this is patently untrue. Perhaps his most damaging falsehood was accusing the Chinese President of visiting to extend a “loan” at “high interest rates”, which insultingly implicates China’s president in government corruption. This statement could undermine Pakistan’s strongest diplomatic relationship and Imran seemingly does not care. While the participation of women in his protests is commendable, there was no greater insult to the intelligence than his party celebrating ‘Women’s Day’ on Wednesday and his statement: “They [western countries] do not respect women the way we do here in Pakistan.” Yes Imran, tell that to the 869 women killed for honour last year, or the woman beaten to death by relatives in front of the Lahore High Court, or Amina from Muzaffargarh who burned herself alive in front of a police station after being gang raped. Tell that to the Taliban you called ‘brothers’; their respect for women is well known. But one must understand that in Imran Khan’s ‘mind’ it is impossible for him to be guilty of wrongdoing. His violence is not violence; his lust for power is not corruption. His famed dalliances mark his ‘respect’ for women. No sane person could want such a mind at the helm of a nuclear armed state, which is why Imran continues to try and drive us mad. *