PTI's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa parliamentary party backs talks with Centre to end governor's rule and emergency
More than 40 PTI lawmakers from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa have backed negotiations with the federal government, saying dialogue should pave the way for withdrawing governor's rule and the state of emergency in the province.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa parliamentary party has backed opening negotiations with the federal government, with members arguing that dialogue should lead to the withdrawal of governor's rule and the state of emergency in the province.
The position emerged from the party's provincial parliamentary meeting, held online on Friday, which was attended by more than 40 lawmakers, according to sources cited by Geo News. Former chief minister Ali Amin Gandapur was among those present, while party chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan and Noor-ul-Haq Qadri also took part in the session.
Those at the meeting were reported to have taken the view that talks with the federal government were the way to resolve the province's political standoff, and that any dialogue should be structured so that it results in the two measures being lifted. The parliamentary party maintained that the party's electoral mandate in the province would be restored once governor's rule and the emergency came to an end.
Some members also proposed that Gandapur be included in the consultation process around any negotiations, a suggestion that underlines his continuing centrality to the party's provincial politics even after the change of government in Peshawar. No formal negotiating team or timetable was announced in the reports of the meeting.
Barrister Gohar told the meeting that a majority of PTI lawmakers in the National Assembly also favoured talks with the federal government, according to the same reports. That alignment between the provincial and federal parliamentary wings, if it holds, would give any future negotiating effort a broader base inside the party than a province-only initiative.
PTI leader Shaukat Yousafzai publicly threw his weight behind the approach, urging the federal government to lower the political temperature. “We are in favour of negotiations. The federal government should reduce tensions and remove governor's rule and the emergency,” he said.
The meeting did not specifically discuss the proposed electoral reforms committee or the Pakistan Peoples Party's offer to the opposition to join it, because that matter is being handled at the federal parliamentary level, the reports said. That separation matters: it suggests the party is keeping the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa question on a separate track from the wider electoral-reform debate in Islamabad.
Governor's rule and the emergency were imposed in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on 11 October, removing the PTI-led provincial government. The federal government has defended the measures on security grounds, pointing to rising militant attacks and what it described as a breakdown in the province's constitutional order, while PTI has condemned them as an assault on the people's mandate.
The party chairman had already signalled the direction of travel earlier in the week, telling reporters outside Parliament that the parliamentary party would work to reverse the two measures and fill what he called the political vacuum they had created. Friday's provincial meeting turns that general commitment into a specific backing for talks.
What happens next will depend on whether the federal government responds to the overture and on what terms any dialogue is held. Previous exchanges have foundered on conditions around talks, and neither side has yet publicly set out a negotiating agenda, a venue or a deadline.
For now, the significance of Friday's meeting lies in its internal signal: the party's Khyber Pakhtunkhwa lawmakers, meeting together for the first time since the measures were imposed, have chosen negotiation over continued confrontation as their stated route back to government. Whether that choice opens a door in Islamabad remains the open question.
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