Fears, doubts, hope, ambition — they all come in a package for Pakistan where days before an election, it is still possible for the people to wonder suspiciously: are we going to have an election?
It is not unusual for a general election in Pakistan to be an incomplete affair as the case of the first general election held in 1970 shows. The Awami League won a majority but was denied power and this ended in the creation of Bangladesh.
The 1977 election was rigged and led to a coup and to the judicial murder of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. Political parties were barred in the 1985 polls and, in 1988, a policy to contain the PPP was executed. That policy was in full force in 1990 as evidenced in the Asghar Khan case.
The 1993 election was boycotted by the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (now Muttahida Qaumi Movement). One of the main beneficiaries of the MQM boycott then was the Jamaat-i-Islami and in 1997, it was the JI’s turn to stay away from the polls.
The 2002 election was engineered. The top leadership of the PML-N was in exile and the PPP chairperson also decided to not return to the country for that election due to pending court cases. It was still a few years before Benazir Bhutto was to strike a deal with Gen Musharraf, which paved the way for her return and that of the Sharifs to Pakistani politics.
The 2008 election was boycotted by many. The JI refused to be drawn into the exercise, even though as part of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, it had provided some political weight to the general. Imran Khan was another ex-Musharraf ally who did not take part, but the most conspicuous absence was that of the nationalists in Balochistan which was still reeling under the fatal blow Gen Musharraf dealt Akbar Bugti.
Come election 2013, and the containment job was taken over by the militants. The Taliban spelt out their disapproval of the PPP, MQM and the Awami National Party in no uncertain terms, and in Balochistan a band of insurgents with their own ideology sought to thwart the polls. Rallies were attacked in Sindh, Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Punjab, where two parties whose credentials had been approved by the Taliban appeared to be locked in a battle, was fortunately spared. Punjab has always been the ‘key’. The unevenness of the 2013 polls have added a new dimension to Pakistan’s choice: the new leader has to be approved by Punjab and selected by the extremists, or vice versa.
But the prevailing fear predates the militants’ disapproval. It is rooted in the frequent derailing of the system of democracy. It will take Pakistanis a while to get used to the new ‘conspiracy’ hatched by elements who avowedly claim there is no turning back of democracy here any more. The delicate system has to be frequently propped up by calls by the army chief and the international powers. And the words of these guardians have an urgent ring to them that is reserved for the new entrants.
So it is a fresh start once more for a new Pakistan rather than a continuation of the ‘grand’ tradition that the restoration of democracy in 2008 had kicked off.
