Serious questions are being raised about the integrity and fairness of the upcoming elections as many believe that the results have already been decided by the Army
With just over a month left for general elections in Pakistan, the political environment remains tepid. Campaigning is still to pick up steam. The usual enthusiasm and excitement that accompanies a general election is missing, as is the large-scale political mobilisation that is such an integral part of the electoral process. A big reason for this lack of interest is because serious questions are being raised about the integrity, transparency and fairness of the elections. There is almost a consensus among political analysts that the results have already been decided by the military establishment even before a single vote has been cast: Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N) will emerge as the single largest party, Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) will not be allowed to win, and the other parties like Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Jamiat Ulema Islam (JUI-F) of Maulana Fazlur Rehman, the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) and Istehkam Pakistan Party (IPP) will get some share of the electoral cake.
The usual enthusiasm and excitement that accompanies a general election is missing, as is the large-scale political mobilisation that is such an integral part of the electoral process.
The hounding of PTI, arguably Pakistan's most popular party, has few parallels even in that country’s sordid political history. PTI founder Imran Khan is in jail and has been disqualified from the elections. Most of its prominent candidates have had their nomination papers rejected. The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has withdrawn the PTI’s election symbol which means that its candidates will have to contest as independents. Although the Peshawar High Court first set aside the ECP ruling and later upheld it, there is a huge amount of uncertainty on whether the PTI will manage to retain its election symbol going to the hustings. PTI candidates are being intimidated, arrested, and prevented from even holding corner meetings.
But it is not only PTI that is facing the heat. Other political players like the new favourite, Nawaz Sharif, and the PPP are also complaining that they are being forced to enter into political deals or their political space is being constricted by the ‘powerful quarters’—a euphemism for the ‘establishment’. In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) the JUI-F and the National Democratic Movement candidates have been targeted by terrorists. Maulana Fazlur Rehman has already demanded that elections be postponed because of the security threat in K-P and Balochistan.
For its part, even the military establishment led by Gen Asim Munir wouldn’t mind elections being pushed forward. Its political strategy hasn’t quite worked the way it was imagined. Nawaz Sharif’s return from a self-imposed exile has not exactly set the river Ravi on fire. Despite being favoured by the military establishment, and being seen as leading the next government, the PML-N has just not been able to connect with the crowds and regain its old voter base. It is bereft of new ideas and has so far not given any concrete plan of action on how to fix the economy. The 9-point agenda it has proposed is full of generalities and contains no details on how this agenda is to be achieved.
Nawaz Sharif’s return from a self-imposed exile has not exactly set the river Ravi on fire.
The breakaway factions of PTI-IPP in Punjab and PTI-Parliamentarians (PTI-P) in K-P—have proved to be damp squibs. With a lot of help from the state machinery, these two parties have managed to corral the PTI ‘electables’ into their camp. But they are finding no resonance on the ground. Neither of these breakaway PTI factions has made any significant dent in the PTI support base. The heavy-handed use of state power to degrade and dismantle the PTI has worked only to the extent of desertion of most of the prominent politicians from its ranks, and caused damage to its organisational capacity and capability. However, the use of the military’s brute force has not had much impact on the mass support and popularity of Imran Khan.
Of course, in Pakistan, election results don’t necessarily have a direct correlation with popular support. What works is the Stalinist dictum—“those who vote decide nothing; those who count votes decide everything”—albeit with Pakistani characteristics. This means that results are not just decided by those who count votes but also by those charged with conducting the elections and those who announce the results. Under normal circumstances, the election results would have very much been a done deal for the Pakistan military establishment. But the military is jumpy and nervous. The reason is that there has never been such a deep schism between the street and the state in Pakistan.
The street is sullen, even defiant, including in Punjab from where the bulk of the Army is recruited and from where it derives all its support. In other provinces, especially Balochistan but increasingly also in K-P, relations between the state and street have always been strained. At a time when state and street tensions in the trans-Indus provinces are spiking—in K-P because of the Imran factor and in Balochistan because of the enforced disappearances, custodial killings, and brutality of the military—the last thing the Pakistan Army needs is a widening cleavage between state and street in Punjab. For all the power that the Pakistan Army wields, beyond a certain point, even it cannot afford to ignore the sentiment on the street and even less within its rank and file. Whenever the street in Punjab turns hostile—against Ayub Khan in 1968, against Yahya after the 1971 debacle, against Zia in 1987-88, against Musharraf in 2007—the Army makes an in-house change.
The growing disconnect between political players and the street, especially in Punjab, means they can no longer play the critical role of a bridge between the state and the street.
Traditionally, in Pakistan, people tend to naturally gravitate to the side that is most likely to come into power. But that doesn’t seem to be happening this time. Imran Khan’s supporters might have been airbrushed from Pakistan’s “independent media”, and their voices might have been suppressed and repressed, but just because they aren’t vocal and visible doesn’t mean they aren’t there. The military is quite uncomfortable with this mass of disaffected voters who are rooting for Imran Khan. It also knows that the political parties and ‘electables’ aligning with the military will be seen as representatives of the state, and not of the street. The growing disconnect between political players and the street, especially in Punjab, means they can no longer play the critical role of a bridge between the state and the street. In other words, they bring no real value to the table.
The dilemma for the military establishment is that exercising the option of postponing or delaying the elections will solve nothing. It will only deepen the political and constitutional crisis in Pakistan, and make it more unmanageable. The Pakistan Army isn't exactly scoring very high on the popularity charts. This is quite apparent from the fact that even someone like Nawaz Sharif who is all set to ride into power on the shoulders of the Army is taking pains to not be seen as a ‘ladla’ of the Pakistan Army. He is demanding accountability of all those responsible (including former generals) for the mess that they have made by foisting Imran Khan. All political players want the Army’s backing but no one wants to be seen as a proxy of the Army. If elections are postponed, many of the political stakeholders who are siding up with the Army in the hope of getting a look into power will turn against it. There is also a real danger that Pakistan's economic lifeline could be severed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and some Western countries if even the nominal and cosmetic democratic system is derailed.
All political players want the Army’s backing but no one wants to be seen as a proxy of the Army.
But holding the elections will also not solve anything because these polls have already become extremely controversial. Those who form the government will just not have the political capital that is required to take the extremely difficult decisions of war and peace, and of economic and political reform, that have become necessary for the survival of the state. What the Pakistan Army faces is a wicked problem which is further confounded by the fact that all its political calculations are likely to go awry, regardless of whether it gets desired results or unexpected ones.
As things stand, three possible results could emerge. The best-case scenario for the military establishment is a hung assembly in which the PML-N leads a coalition government which includes parties like IPP, MQM, and JUI-F which are closely aligned with the Army. The military will have not only succeeded in keeping PTI and Imran Khan out of office but it will also have ensured control over the government through its political proxies. The problem is that such a misaligned and unwieldy coalition will, by definition, be weak and will find it very difficult to deliver on the very onerous economic, political, diplomatic and security challenges that loom large before it. This arrangement will not have a very long shelf life.
The next best scenario is that the military miscalculates and overplays its hand, and ends up handing Nawaz Sharif a majority at both the federal level and in Punjab. With Nawaz Sharif at the helm, it will only be a matter of time before the civil-military conflict re-emerges. To a point, Nawaz Sharif will be loath to take instructions from the military. He will want to do his own thing and won’t allow back-seat driving by the Army on matters of economic, foreign, and security policy. While the Army would prefer a pliable and compliant Shehbaz Sharif as Prime Minister, the younger Sharif just does not have the political weight of Nawaz Sharif. Plus, Shehbaz didn’t exactly distinguish himself while he was serving as the prime minister for 16 months after Imran Khan was voted out of office in April 2022.
The Pakistan Army will not mind a handful of PTI candidates winning—that will give some credibility to the elections.
The worst, but also least likely, scenario is that the PTI upsets all calculations and wins a large number of seats. This theoretical possibility will occur only if the turnout is so large and votes polled for PTI-supported candidates so high that manipulating results becomes impossible for the establishment. In the event of this scenario unfolding, the current political system will collapse, which is precisely why the military will pull out all stops to ensure it doesn’t happen. The Pakistan Army will not mind a handful of PTI candidates winning—that will give some credibility to the elections. In fact, if PTI candidates win as independents then it could work in favour of the Army because they will be susceptible to all kinds of blandishments and blackmail to switch to whichever side the ‘establishment’ wants.
The 2024 elections were supposed to bring a modicum of stability in Pakistan. But that now appears to be quite a far cry, even more so because the military establishment is doubling down on the political, diplomatic, security and strategic follies of the past, many of which are going to bite back and cause serious damage to Pakistan.
Sushant Sareen is a Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation
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Sushant Sareen is Senior Fellow at Observer Research Foundation. His published works include: Balochistan: Forgotten War, Forsaken People (Monograph, 2017) Corridor Calculus: China-Pakistan Economic Corridor & China’s comprador ...
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