Two major political developments have transpired in the country in the first week of August. Imran Khan was finally convicted by the court in the Toshakhana case and sentenced to three years in prison, and automatically disqualified from contesting any elections for public office. Secondly, the Council of Common Interests has approved the results of the digital census of 2023, and now the ball is in the Election Commission’s court, who will have to demarcate new constituencies for the next elections.
The election commission has yet to give their comment on this new situation, but it goes without saying that the election could be delayed by at least three to four months. In this new configuration, Punjab will definitely lose some National Assembly seats while Sindh, Baluchistan and KPK will benefit from additional seats in the National Assembly. PML-N, with its power base in Punjab, appears to be a major loser, while the PPP and the MQM will benefit in interior Sindh and Karachi.
Pakistan’s first general elections were scheduled to be held in 1958 under the newly formulated Constitution of Pakistan of 1956. Just before the elections, the country was placed under martial law and the long night of ten years of dictatorship began with Ayub Khan at the head of the martial law team. Since that first era of martial rule, the country has gone through many elections, but ironically the country and the people of Pakistan have never shown any faith or confidence in the transparency, integrity or fairness of the electoral process.
We cannot state with any confidence an example of a single election in the last seven decades that has not seen allegations of cheating, fraud, rigging or interference by state institutions to alter the results to suit a certain interest group or the seemingly all-powerful establishment. Recently, some prominent lawmakers in the USA gave some suggestions on how to ensure the credibility and fairness of the next general elections in Pakistan, but ironically, this received no response from the government or the media, but their suggestion has to be taken seriously in our best national interest.
The next general elections are around the corner, but it goes without saying that this election too will be punctuated by howls of cheating, rigging and mismanagement. The ground reality today is that the PML-N is well placed and has the support of the powerful establishment that has been the power behind the throne throughout the country’s history. The PPP appears to be quite satisfied with ruling the roost in Sindh and playing a major role at the federal level. The PTI, with the arrest of Imran Khan, has been eliminated and appears to have disintegrated completely, but still commands a great deal of support among the urban middle class and youth of the country.
The army leadership — having little confidence in the ability of civilian governments to deliver, even if it is of its choice — wants to retain a hold over major policy issues and critical areas. The latest legislation under Section 175-E (national development) proposes that the “Pakistan Army may, upon direction or with the concurrence of relevant authorities of the appropriate government in the prescribed manner, directly or indirectly, carry out activities related to, inter alia, national development and advancement of national or strategic interest.” The legislation can be applied with retrospective effect.
In a long political history peppered with military rule for over three decades, the 2018 election was a successful transition of political power through the constitutional process from one elected government to another. However, once again cries of protests were heard immediately after the results were announced. Political leaders, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and some international agencies such as the European Union alleged that irregularities and massive rigging had taken place in many parts of the country, particularly in Punjab and Sindh provinces. The winner of the elections, Imran Khan, was dubbed the Prime Minister Select, who was catapulted into power by the powerful military establishment with the support of the country’s intelligence establishment.
The fact of the matter is that the only fair and freed elections held in Pakistan were the 1970 elections held under the Legal Framework Order (LFO) of a military Dictator General Yahiya Khan that ended in the secession of East Pakistan. After those polls, there has not been a single election that can be called fair and free. Historically speaking, election rigging in Pakistan has occurred at multiple levels, with the connivance of state institutions, the establishment, polling officers and, of course, political parties and candidates. The cheating and rigging process can be divided into three categories namely, pre-poll rigging, polling day rigging and finally post-poll rigging. The first step of the rigging process is the manipulation of the census; the census is one of the first and most important parts of the election process, as it determines how many seats a province will be allocated. The number of seats given to a province is decided according to the population settled there, with approximately 780,000 people being assigned one National Assembly seat in this year's calculations. If the population of an area is shown to be lesser or greater than it actually is, the voting power of the people living in that area can be diluted or bolstered, compared to other parts of the country.
The population census is a vital component for someone planning to rig the elections. That is why the MQM in Karachi has been shouting from the roof tops to have the new elections on the basis of the results of the 2023 digital census, after a thorough audit of the results. The MQM and the PPP claimed that the population of the province and Karachi specifically had been understated to deny them the allocation of seats that they should have gotten.
Another tactic in pre-poll rigging is to get the nomination papers of the opposing candidate rejected by the Returning Officer. Influential and powerful candidates succeed in getting the RO on their side through shady and underhanded methods, to ensure their own success.
The second phase in election rigging is rigging on the day of the polls; the best way to do this is to capture the polling booths and to force the election staff to do the candidate’s bidding. This happens to be the most common form of rigging.
In post-poll rigging, the presiding officer plays a vital role in the rigging process during vote counting as he is the one who needs to ensure that all polling agents are witness to the counting process. At times, the polling agents are excluded from the process, allowing the manipulation of votes and leaving no proof for the results to be challenged later on. For example, Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali won the 2013 elections by 4,000 votes and yet 30,000 votes were rejected during the vote count, demonstrating how badly the vote counting process is flawed. The most common method is to bribe voters through inducements such as cash rewards to important and influential people in the local area.
The election commission has yet to give their comment on this new situation, but it goes without saying that the election could be delayed by at least three to four months. In this new configuration, Punjab will definitely lose some National Assembly seats while Sindh, Baluchistan and KPK will benefit from additional seats in the National Assembly. PML-N, with its power base in Punjab, appears to be a major loser, while the PPP and the MQM will benefit in interior Sindh and Karachi.
Pakistan’s first general elections were scheduled to be held in 1958 under the newly formulated Constitution of Pakistan of 1956. Just before the elections, the country was placed under martial law and the long night of ten years of dictatorship began with Ayub Khan at the head of the martial law team. Since that first era of martial rule, the country has gone through many elections, but ironically the country and the people of Pakistan have never shown any faith or confidence in the transparency, integrity or fairness of the electoral process.
We cannot state with any confidence an example of a single election in the last seven decades that has not seen allegations of cheating, fraud, rigging or interference by state institutions to alter the results to suit a certain interest group or the seemingly all-powerful establishment. Recently, some prominent lawmakers in the USA gave some suggestions on how to ensure the credibility and fairness of the next general elections in Pakistan, but ironically, this received no response from the government or the media, but their suggestion has to be taken seriously in our best national interest.
The next general elections are around the corner, but it goes without saying that this election too will be punctuated by howls of cheating, rigging and mismanagement. The ground reality today is that the PML-N is well placed and has the support of the powerful establishment that has been the power behind the throne throughout the country’s history. The PPP appears to be quite satisfied with ruling the roost in Sindh and playing a major role at the federal level. The PTI, with the arrest of Imran Khan, has been eliminated and appears to have disintegrated completely, but still commands a great deal of support among the urban middle class and youth of the country.
The army leadership — having little confidence in the ability of civilian governments to deliver, even if it is of its choice — wants to retain a hold over major policy issues and critical areas. The latest legislation under Section 175-E (national development) proposes that the “Pakistan Army may, upon direction or with the concurrence of relevant authorities of the appropriate government in the prescribed manner, directly or indirectly, carry out activities related to, inter alia, national development and advancement of national or strategic interest.” The legislation can be applied with retrospective effect.
In a long political history peppered with military rule for over three decades, the 2018 election was a successful transition of political power through the constitutional process from one elected government to another. However, once again cries of protests were heard immediately after the results were announced. Political leaders, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan and some international agencies such as the European Union alleged that irregularities and massive rigging had taken place in many parts of the country, particularly in Punjab and Sindh provinces. The winner of the elections, Imran Khan, was dubbed the Prime Minister Select, who was catapulted into power by the powerful military establishment with the support of the country’s intelligence establishment.
The fact of the matter is that the only fair and freed elections held in Pakistan were the 1970 elections held under the Legal Framework Order (LFO) of a military Dictator General Yahiya Khan that ended in the secession of East Pakistan. After those polls, there has not been a single election that can be called fair and free. Historically speaking, election rigging in Pakistan has occurred at multiple levels, with the connivance of state institutions, the establishment, polling officers and, of course, political parties and candidates. The cheating and rigging process can be divided into three categories namely, pre-poll rigging, polling day rigging and finally post-poll rigging. The first step of the rigging process is the manipulation of the census; the census is one of the first and most important parts of the election process, as it determines how many seats a province will be allocated. The number of seats given to a province is decided according to the population settled there, with approximately 780,000 people being assigned one National Assembly seat in this year's calculations. If the population of an area is shown to be lesser or greater than it actually is, the voting power of the people living in that area can be diluted or bolstered, compared to other parts of the country.
The population census is a vital component for someone planning to rig the elections. That is why the MQM in Karachi has been shouting from the roof tops to have the new elections on the basis of the results of the 2023 digital census, after a thorough audit of the results. The MQM and the PPP claimed that the population of the province and Karachi specifically had been understated to deny them the allocation of seats that they should have gotten.
Another tactic in pre-poll rigging is to get the nomination papers of the opposing candidate rejected by the Returning Officer. Influential and powerful candidates succeed in getting the RO on their side through shady and underhanded methods, to ensure their own success.
The second phase in election rigging is rigging on the day of the polls; the best way to do this is to capture the polling booths and to force the election staff to do the candidate’s bidding. This happens to be the most common form of rigging.
In post-poll rigging, the presiding officer plays a vital role in the rigging process during vote counting as he is the one who needs to ensure that all polling agents are witness to the counting process. At times, the polling agents are excluded from the process, allowing the manipulation of votes and leaving no proof for the results to be challenged later on. For example, Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali won the 2013 elections by 4,000 votes and yet 30,000 votes were rejected during the vote count, demonstrating how badly the vote counting process is flawed. The most common method is to bribe voters through inducements such as cash rewards to important and influential people in the local area.