The local as well as international media have been waiting with bated breath for the poll results in Pakistan ever since the conduction of general elections nationwide on Wednesday.

In what seems like a sweeping victory for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) chairman Imran Khan, many globally-recognised journalists, intellectuals and writers believe it is only Khan who can turn around the fate of Pakistan.

British journalist Peter Obourne believes how Imran Khan is the one man who can lift Pakistan from the deep dungeons to progressiveness, in a similar fashion as he led the country’s cricket team to historic win in 1992 World Cup.

“….And I believe Imran Khan is more than capable of repeating, on the world stage, what he did for Pakistan Test cricket decades ago.

“He could lift his country out of the doldrums and turn it into an efficient and well-run state, capable of realising its fabulous potential,” Obourne writes.

On the other hand, commenting on Khan’s opponents’ reservations regarding massive poll rigging, Obourne writes:

“Last night, all rival parties alleged massive election rigging had gone on in order to secure a Khan victory. In his defence, neither of his major opponents — Nawaz Sharif’s Muslim League nor the Pakistan People’s Party — are foreign to the practice of election rigging. Quite the reverse.

Khan’s critics say, too, that he is too close to the far-Right religious parties which have done so much to promote bigotry in what was once a tolerant country. Cruelly, he’s been nicknamed ‘Taliban Khan’.

The fact is that Khan is by no means the first Pakistani politician to form alliances with the religious Right or the military establishment.”

Nonetheless, Obourne in his article, firmly believes Khan is the only ray of hope.

“If anybody can turn Pakistan into a creative force for good on the world stage, it is Imran Khan.

He has already made an extraordinary journey from being a young Worcester schoolboy with cricketing ambitions in the Sixties to the top of Pakistani politics. But the most difficult stage of his battle still lies ahead,” he concludes.

(Article published in Daily Mail).