ISLAMABAD, Oct 6: President Gen Pervez Musharraf on Saturday won a one-sided election for another five-year term from a truncated parliamentary electoral college amid boycotts and protests while the fate of the 55 per cent votes cast for him by his own loyalists, still lay in the hands of the Supreme Court.

As only a few votes were cast against him in what were left as opposition-less two houses of parliament and four provincial assemblies and for a symbolic rival, there was partial strike in some cities and towns while lawyers held protests against Gen Musharraf’s disputed candidacy.

He got 384 votes, or 55 per cent, of the 702-vote, but 1,170-member electoral college, which was hugely depleted by resignations by most opposition parties earlier this week and a last-minute walkout by the People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP), the largest opposition party, despite a controversial National Reconciliation Ordinance he issued on Friday to meet some of its demands for a smooth transition to full democracy.

Of them, 252 votes came from 257 polled in a joint meeting of the 342-seat National Assembly and the 100-seat Senate in Islamabad, after three ballot papers were cancelled, and the rest from the provincial assemblies calculated on a proportional representation formula that gives each of them, despite their varying strengths, votes equal to the lowest 65 of the Balochistan Assembly.

Former Supreme Court judge Wajihuddin Ahmed, who stood as only a symbolic rival, as did PPP chairman Makhdoom Amin Fahim, to be able to pose legal challenges to Gen Musharraf’s candidature before the Election Commission and then to the Supreme Court, got a total of five votes -- two from the two houses of parliament and, according to the calculation formula, one each from the Punjab (against three members), Sindh (against two members) and the NWFP (against two members).

No vote was cast for Mr Fahim and a covering PPP candidate, Mrs Faryal Talpur, after the party said it was “abstaining” from the process -- rather than resigning like other parties grouped in the All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) alliance — in what was actually a boycott on the ground the president was standing while continuing as army chief.

It was the first time in 60 years of Pakistan’s life that an army chief was elected president. The country’s first military ruler Mohammad Ayub Khan became an un-retiring field marshal but handed over to General Mohammad Musa as army commander-in-chief before his 1964 election from a 40,000-strong electoral college of Basic Democrats while the second, General Mohammad Zia-ul-Haq, got himself elected through a controversial referendum as did General Musharraf for his present term in 2002.

Chief Election Commissioner Qazi Mohammad Farooq announced what is called as unofficial count of vote held at the parliament house in Islamabad from 10am to 3pm, to cheers and “President Musharraf Zindabad” slogans from about 40 ruling coalition members who were still present there with Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and Pakistan Muslim League President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, although a Supreme Court bench has forbidden a formal notification of the winner until it finally rules over petitions challenging General Musharraf’s candidacy.

The 10-member bench had refused pleas from the lawyers of Mr Fahim and Mr Wajihuddin on Friday to stay the election before adjourning the hearing of their petitions until Oct 17.

Shortly before the polling started, Mr Fahim told a brief sitting of the National Assembly that the PPP adhered to its “stand from the first day” that “democracy and uniform can’t go together.

“It is to defend this position that we will not vote for General Musharraf and will abstain,” he said before leading his party members out of the house without waiting to hear what Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Khan Niazi, a PPP defector after the 2002 elections, and a few other ruling coalition members had to say to defend their candidate.

At the same time, announcement of boycott of the polling by the opposition were also made at a sitting of the Senate by leader of opposition Mian Raza Rabbani of the PPP and some members from APDM parties before chairman Mohammedmian Soomro prorogued the house amid “go Musharraf go” chants.

During the polling in the National Assembly chamber, names of many APDM members who had resigned on Friday, including leader of opposition and MMA secretary-general Maulana Fazlur Rehman and Jamaat-i-Islami’s Liaquat Baloch, were called to cast their votes, indicating that Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain had not yet accepted their resignations.

There was great focus on at least two defectors from the MMA and one from the Awami National Party, who were taken around by Political Affairs Minister and earlier MMA defector Amir Muqam as his trophies.

The APDM parties had resigned from about 200 seats from the National Assembly and the provincial assemblies in a move to rob the presidential election of political legitimacy while the electoral college’s demise is due with the completion of the assemblies’ five-year terms on Nov 15.

But the process was spared a further erosion of credibility by a last-minute government agreement on a political package with the PPP to avoid resignations by the party and the failure of the MMA alliance ruling the North-West Frontier Province to dissolve the provincial assembly before the presidential vote.

 

	Votes polled	Musharraf	Wajihuddin	Rejected
NA & Senate	257	252	2	3
Punjab	257	253	3	1
Sindh	104	102	2	0
Balochistan	33	33	0	0
NWFP	34	31	1	2