ISLAMABAD – Jailed former Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan and most of his supporters have been rejected as candidates in the Feb. 8 election, party officials said Sunday after nominations for the vote were closed.

Khan has been in prison since August, facing trial on a series of cases that he claims were staged to prevent him from running as the figurehead of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party to participate.

The former cricket star was found guilty of bribery earlier this year, but a court suspended his three-year sentence and the verdict is being appealed.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) disqualified him from office because of the conviction, but the PTI still filed nomination papers for Khan last week.

“Nomination papers of almost all national and provincial leaders of the PTI, including Imran Khan, have been rejected,” said PTI spokesperson Raoof Hasan. “90 to 95 percent of our candidates’ applications were rejected.”

Hasan told AFP that blocking candidates was part of an “agenda” to prevent the PTI from taking part in the election in six weeks.

“To this end, all tactics will be tried, but under no circumstances will we abandon the political ground and boycott the elections,” he said.

An Election Commission official confirmed to AFP that several PTI candidates, including Khan, had been rejected due to his conviction.

Such a widespread crackdown on a single party is “unprecedented” in Pakistan, political scientist Hasan Askari told AFP.

“This is the first time in the history of the country that a political party has been excluded from the electoral process on such a large scale before the election,” he said.

State institutions want to stop the PTI from participating in elections “at any cost” and “the chances of the PTI being exonerated are very slim,” he added.

The ECP is expected to announce the final list of candidates on January 23.

The PTI’s claim that it has already been excluded from the voting process is likely to lead to a series of appeals to the ECP and various courts.

“We remain committed to the elections and will appeal all these decisions in every constituency and use all our constitutional, legal and political options,” PTI spokesperson Hasan said.

Khan, 71, was ousted last year after falling out with Pakistan’s powerful military leaders who brought him to power in 2018.

In contrast, he waged an unprecedented campaign of resistance against the military establishment that has directly ruled the country for much of its history.

Khan accused them of precipitating his ouster in a no-confidence vote through a US-backed conspiracy and of plotting an assassination attempt in which he was wounded.

After Khan’s brief imprisonment sparked unrest in May, the PTI experienced a massive crackdown, with leading figures either jailed or forced to quit the party.