Pakistan’s top court ruled on Friday that the party of former prime minister Imran Khan should receive 23 additional seats in Parliament, a decision that is expected to deepen the political turmoil that has embroiled the country since Mr. Khan was ousted from power two years ago.
The ruling strips the governing coalition, led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, of its two-thirds majority in Parliament, weakening his already fragile government and emboldening the opposition led by Mr. Khan’s party.
Mr. Sharif’s government came to power five months ago after general elections that were marred by allegations that the country’s powerful military had rigged dozens of races and tipped the scales against Mr. Khan’s party. Pakistan’s generals, who have long been seen as an invisible hand guiding the nation’s politics, have been at odds with Mr. Khan since he was ousted from power in 2022.
But in a stunning rebuke to military leaders, candidates loyal to Mr. Khan won a majority of seats in the National Assembly in the last election — a victory that shattered the military’s once invincible image.
The opposition’s victory reflected the recent swell of discontent with the generals’ influence in politics since Mr. Khan’s ouster, which he accused the military of orchestrating. Those accusations sparked mass protests across the country, challenging the military’s authority like never before. Mr. Khan, a former captain of the country’s popular national cricket team, was imprisoned in August on what he says were trumped up political charges.
Despite winning the majority of seats in Parliament during the last election, Mr. Khan’s party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, or P.T.I., was not allotted any of the 70 unelected seats reserved for women and minorities, which are typically handed out in proportion to the number of elected seats a party secures.
Instead, those seats were allocated to parties in Mr. Sharif’s governing coalition, giving it a critical two-thirds majority.
The Supreme Court ruling on Friday forced the National Assembly to redistribute some of those reserved seats to P.T.I., making it the single largest party in the National Assembly.
P.T.I. supporters hailed the decision as a major victory in a country where the military has increasingly taken a front seat in politics, more overtly shaping the country’s foreign and domestic policies.
“At a time when Pakistan’s democracy faces severe threats and all democratic norms are being eroded, the Supreme Court’s decision is a welcome relief,” said Fawad Chaudhry, a former information minister in Mr. Khan’s party. “This ruling is a crucial step forward in fortifying democracy in Pakistan.”
The decision came as Mr. Sharif planned to introduce broad judicial reforms, including extending the tenure of the Supreme Court chief justice. Critics said these measures were aimed at influencing the judiciary for political gain.
While Mr. Sharif’s coalition retains a simple majority in Parliament, without a two-thirds majority it will most likely be unable to enact those planned reforms. His coalition, which was already considered weak because it lacked popular support, will now face additional questions over its ability to govern, analysts say.
No prime minister has ever completed a full term in office in Pakistan. The ruling on Friday has added to speculation that Mr. Sharif’s government may, too, face an early end.
On Friday, officials in his coalition sought to downplay the effects of the Supreme Court’s decision.
“As far as the government’s stability is concerned, the ruling coalition has a visible majority,” Azam Nazeer Tarar, the law minister, said at a news conference. A simple majority in Pakistan’s Parliament is 169 out of a total of 336 seats. Still, he added, the government’s ability to pass crucial legislation has been affected.
The decision is the latest sign of the country’s judiciary growing more assertive in challenging the military, analysts said.
In recent months, judges in several lower courts have accused the country’s intelligence agencies of trying to coerce them and have openly criticized the military’s meddling in judicial affairs. The tension between the courts and the military has been exacerbated by the legal cases against Mr. Khan.
“The judges are upending everything that the military establishment had put in place,” said Talat Hussain, an Islamabad-based political analyst. “They have on their side the lawyer bars, a popular party, a popular narrative, and an extremely incompetent government that doesn’t know whether it is staying or going.”
Even before the general election was held in February, anger at the military was brewing across the country among Mr. Khan’s supporters who took to the streets to criticize military leaders more openly and boldly than ever before.
While military leaders hoped the general election would quell that unrest, it only added to the growing discontent. One major point of contention was that Pakistan’s Election Commission forced P.T.I. candidates to run as independents — making them ineligible to receive any of the unelected, reserved seats in Parliament.
The Supreme Court verdict on Friday overruled the Election Commission’s decisions, saying that P.T.I. should be afforded all of the constitutional and legal rights of any political party — thrusting P.T.I. back onto the political main stage.
“As a political party, the P.T.I. is entitled to its reserved seats,” Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa said while reading out the order in court.
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