PESHAWAR: Pakistan’s main opposition party will intensify a planned nationwide protest campaign, the chief minister of the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said on Friday, adding that the jailed former prime minister Imran Khan had personally instructed him to step up mobilization.
The announcement came after Khan was returned to prison in Rawalpindi following overnight medical treatment at a state-run Islamabad hospital, despite a Supreme Court order directing authorities to take him to the private Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad.
Khan’s sister Uzma Khan, who was allowed to see him during the hospital visit, told reporters earlier on Friday that Khan had specifically instructed Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi through her to intensify a protest movement already planned by his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party.
PTI has announced a long march on Islamabad for Sept. 27 as part of its campaign for Khan’s release, access to him in prison and expedited hearings in his legal cases. Afridi had previously said the party aimed to mobilize two million people for the protest.
“Imran Khan has specifically instructed me to intensify the movement,” Afridi told a news conference on Friday afternoon. “God willing, the movement will be more intense than before.”
Afridi heads the government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where Khan’s PTI is the ruling party and retains a powerful political base. He said he would travel to Hangu on Saturday and Buner on Sunday, both districts in the northwestern province, before taking the campaign across Pakistan.
“The movement will intensify and move forward even faster than the public expects,” Afridi said. “The pressure has not shifted. The pressure will now double.”
Afridi said the party would also double its mobilization target following the events surrounding Khan’s hospital treatment.
“Previously, the target for the public gathering was two million. After yesterday’s incident, this target will be doubled,” he said.
PTI has staged repeated rallies and marches demanding Khan’s release since he was jailed in August 2023, including a major march on Islamabad in November 2024 that ended in clashes and a security crackdown after supporters reached the capital’s heavily fortified government district.
Afridi also said PTI’s legal team would pursue contempt proceedings over what the party says was the government’s failure to comply with the Supreme Court order directing that Khan be taken to Shifa International.
Authorities instead took Khan to the state-run Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), while his personal physician, Dr. Faisal Sultan, said he was separately taken to Shifa and waited there for around two to three hours for Khan to arrive.
Information Minister Attaullah Tarar said the venue was changed because PTI supporters had created a “security situation” on the route and outside Shifa. He said Khan underwent a detailed examination at PIMS, was declared medically fit and was returned to Rawalpindi’s Adiala Jail early Friday.
Afridi rejected the government’s explanation, saying the party had issued no instructions for supporters to gather around the prison and disputing claims that PTI workers had created a security problem.
Khan, 73, remains one of Pakistan’s most popular political figures despite more than three years in prison. He says the numerous criminal cases against him are politically motivated, an allegation the government denies.
