As Imran Khan declares victory in Pakistan, journalist predicts 'nasty' conflict

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Supporters of Pakistan cricket legend Imran Khan are celebrating his apparent victory Thursday in the divisive general election, but freelance journalist Shahzeb Jillani doesn't expect the jubilance to last long. 

An official confirmation of the election results is still to come, but Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) party is expected to win a minority. 

Khan, who captained Pakistan to a World Cup victory in 1992, declared his victory amid allegations of vote rigging by almost all of his opponents. 

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Ex-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's party has also alleged that Khan was the military's preferred candidate, in a country that has been largely ruled by the military during its 71 year history. 

Journalist Shahzeb Jillani has been covering the election. He spoke with As It Happens guest host Laura Lynch about why he believes Khan will have a hard time appealing to both the military and the people of Pakistan as prime minister. 

Here is part of that conversation. 

Are people celebrating? Is there anxiety? How is it there?

The nation is divided as you can imagine. Imran Khan has polarized the country.

His supporters are obviously jubilant, especially young people, women, upper and middle class, people who normally do not take part in politics.

But equally in large parts of the country, people are worried because they think he's inexperienced, they believe he has been brought to power by the military and that cannot be good.

I covered a previous Pakistani election some years ago and I had to interview him while he was in hiding because Nawaz Sharif was in charge and wanted him arrested. He's come from that, to this. How did that happened?  

He was a cricket captain in the 1990s. He won Pakistan the cricket cup so there was a lot of charisma, a lot of respect for him.

When he dabbled in politics, people laughed.

It was about 7-8 years ago he held a huge rally in Lahore and that was the first time people started to kind of pay attention to him.

In 2013 elections, five years ago, he did contest. He got a number of votes in the northwestern province Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. He formed a government there. But he did not get enough popular vote to win seats in the parliament.

What he did this year, which has really assured him this victory, is that he was helped allegedly by the army.

What evidence is there that Mr. Khan was supported by the military?

A lot of people who left their parent party, which is either Pakistan People's Party or Nawaz Sharif's party, did not offer strong, convincing case why they were ditching a government they'd been part of for well over four and a half years.

And these people have a reputation of switching loyalties when they feel that the odds are against their current party and somebody else will be brought in.

We know the military has long had a role in ruling Pakistan, either ruling itself or having influence on the politics there. If Imran Khan needed the militaries support to win, what might that mean for the kind of prime minister he'll be?

There has to be realistic expectations of what he wants to do, and what he will be able to do. So for example one of the crucial things that Pakistan has suffered from, is a civil-military imbalance.

Pakistan is now 71-years-old and not a single prime minister has been allowed to complete their tenure.

Imran Khan is expected to be a more compliant prime minister because he knows very well that he needed the support of the state institutions to come to power. He will try not to take them on on foreign policy matters, when it comes to relations with India, with Afghanistan.

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With the United States?

With the United States.

But my feeling is, sooner or later, there will be conflict. And it will be nasty, because he's been brought to power with a lot of hope from his supporters and as he starts to kind of make compromises and change is not happening it will turn out badly.

How soon do you think that conflict will come?

Optimistic view is that it will take a couple of years.

I think it will happen sooner and that's partly because Imran Khan has shown inflexibility in creating political consensus when he wants to do something.

Written by Sarah Jackson with file from Reuters. Produced by Kevin Robertson. Q&A has been edited for length and clarity.