PTI Prepares Legal Challenge as Islamabad Takes Over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Islamabad – The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan is preparing a legal challenge against the federal government's decision to take over Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, which the party has governed since 2013.

Sheikh Waqas Akram, PTI's central information secretary, said the party will file in court on Tuesday to contest the imposition of emergency law and governor's rule in the province. A petition has been drafted by a legal committee headed by PTI Secretary-General Salman Akram Raja, though it remains unclear whether it will be filed with the Supreme Court or the Federal Constitutional Court.

The development has become a new political flashpoint in Pakistan, with sharply divergent interpretations from the government and PTI. It coincides with a march on Islamabad that PTI is staging to pressure authorities into releasing the former prime minister, who has been jailed for more than three years.

On Monday, Interior Minister Mohsin Naqvi argued that federal rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was necessary for Pakistan to effectively counter "terrorism" in the province bordering Afghanistan.

"No war can be won, no matter how many resources you bring or what you do, until the government there leads the war," Naqvi said in Peshawar on Monday.

A day earlier, President Asif Ali Zardari imposed emergency rule and governor's rule, suspending the PTI government in the northwestern province. Suspended Chief Minister Sohail Afridi and several cabinet members have been placed under preventive detention, according to Minister of State for Interior Talal Chaudhry. Afridi was leading the march on Islamabad demanding Khan's release, and PTI leaders insist the protest is continuing.

"The long march is not over. But a historic crackdown on the party has begun," Akram said.

The case for intervention

According to the proclamation issued on Sunday, the provincial government had "failed to demonstrate the responsibility, will and determination to adequately confront the threat of terrorism."

"The federal government's position was clearly stated: 'a deliberate retreat from the war on terror,' as the statement after the cabinet meeting put it. That is the constitutional predicate needed to impose emergency rule," said Aasiya Riaz, deputy director of the Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (PILDAT), an independent political consultancy.

However, Hassan Abdullah Niazi, an adjunct lecturer at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) and a Lahore-based lawyer, disputed that argument.

"If all of that were true, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would be in a state of anarchy, but we know that is not the case. The province has a functioning legislature and executive, trusted by the people, so this whole move is an unconstitutional act against provincial autonomy," he said.

Last month, a more detailed argument was laid out in a 14-page white paper in Islamabad by Ikhtiar Wali Khan, a political adviser to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN). The white paper cited rising police deaths, staffing and equipment shortages at the provincial counterterrorism agency, and spending priorities.

But Akram rejected allegations that PTI had failed to lead the fight. He said the provincial government had spent 1.83 billion rupees ($6.6 million) from its own budget to support the families of more than 900 soldiers, police officers and paramilitary personnel killed fighting armed groups – a contribution he said no other province had made.

What Islamabad wants

At a news conference in Islamabad on Sunday, Interior Minister Naqvi said the federal government had engaged in negotiations with PTI over the party's proposed "sit-in" protest in support of Khan.

"We have no problem with the sit-in. You can hold your sit-in as much as you like, we are not opposed. Our problem relates entirely to terrorism, and we want to draw you into that issue," he said.

Taimur Jhagra, a PTI leader and former provincial finance minister, also said the negotiations the party agreed to with the government were meant to focus on Khan.

"It is absurd that a negotiation about a protest movement aimed at securing Imran Khan's right to medical care and visits under a Supreme Court order turned into a negotiation about counterterrorism strategy," he said.

Naqvi also said PTI had agreed during the talks that emergency rule should be imposed in 12 districts of the province. Akram rejected that, insisting the party had refused out of concern that residents would bear the consequences of military operations.

"We said 'No, that cannot happen. You cannot do whatever you want with them. We get their votes. Tomorrow they will blame us: you got us killed,'" Akram said.

According to Akram, PTI negotiators passed the federal government's proposal to Afridi, and the chief minister rejected it.

Federal Information Minister Attaullah Tarar went further at Sunday's news conference.

"This administration, which was suspended through a constitutional option, must answer for the deaths of thousands of citizens of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa," he said, accusing Afridi's PTI government of colluding with Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan – the armed group known as the Pakistani Taliban – and the Afghan Taliban.

No evidence of such links has been made public.

Security or politics?

According to the government white paper, 122 police officers were killed in the province in the first half of this year, up from 63 in the same period of 2025. Independent monitors have also recorded rising violence. The Islamabad-based Center for Research and Security Studies (CRSS) recorded 556 violence-related deaths in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa from July to September, up from 475 the previous quarter and 311 the quarter before that.

Balochistan was hit harder, with deaths rising 213 percent to 829, making it the worst-affected province, according to CRSS.

The government says it acted because the provincial administration would not lead the fight against armed groups, but analysts disagree about the purpose of the takeover.

"I would say the decision is political, administrative and security-related. All three elements are present," said Zaigham Khan, a political analyst in Islamabad.

Ali Arqam, a longtime observer of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, disagreed: "This is really not a security matter. It is fundamentally a political move dressed up as an administrative necessity."

Jhagra said the government believes the takeover will crush PTI, but argued that people across the country still see Khan as their leader.

"The government is trying to solve a problem of legitimacy," he said.

For his part, Federal Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar insisted at Sunday's news conference in Islamabad that the decision was a purely constitutional step.

A party under pressure

For PTI, the immediate concern is its leaders and the courts. "There is no contact. No one in the party can reach the chief minister," Akram said. The party nonetheless retains broad support both in the province and nationally.

At Monday's meeting, Naqvi said results in the fight against "terrorism" would not come in a day, that there would be ups and downs, and that the period ahead would be harder.

But Arqam argued that Islamabad should be judged by the same stringent standards applied to the PTI government: "Hold this administration to the same hard indicators: has security actually improved, are basic services better, and did the promised financial resources ultimately materialize?"