No-confidence vote for Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan was given that ousted him as the country’s leader. The vote was for allegations of economic mismanagement and mishandling of the country’s foreign policy.
Today, the vote was held for a 342 member assembly and 172 were needed to win on either side. An alliance of politicians against him was backed up by more than a dozen defectors from his own party.
There was a previous vote of no confidence against Imran Khan but was blocked by the Supreme Court last Thursday. It was cited as something “unconstitutional”. Also, Khan made an order earlier to dissolve the parliament and call for early elections. This was again blocked by the Supreme Court saying that it has “no legal effect”.
The speaker of the National Assembly will now send a notice to Khan and call for a fresh session of parliament to elect a new prime minister.
Khan said last Friday that this move was a foreign conspiracy that is backed by the United States. Khan said he had been singled out by the US because, unlike his opponents, he couldn’t “easily be used as a puppet by the West,” with regard to an independent foreign policy. He said he was not anti-American but would not let his nation “be used as a tissue paper” in a “one-sided relationship.”
After the results, he called for a nationwide protest in an attempt to “install” a new government by “foreign powers”.
The US Department issued a statement saying that there is no truth to the former Prime Minister’s claim. “We are closely following developments in Pakistan, and we respect, we support Pakistan’s constitutional process and the rule of law, but when it comes to those allegations, there is no truth to them,” the statement said.