ISLAMABAD/KARACHI, 10 October — Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf yesterday urged his nation to pave the way for real democracy by voting for "competent and honest" candidates in today’s elections. "Pakistan is on the verge of a historic era. It is the responsibility of people, not of the government, to elect efficient representatives," he said in a nationally televised address to the nation.
Musharraf reiterated his promise of a "free, fair and transparent" election and said more than 300 international observers were free to visit any place they wanted to see the conduct of polling.
Some 55 million voters will elect a new National Assembly and four provincial assemblies. Opinion polls predict a tight race between banned ex-Premier Benazir Bhutto’s party and a new pro-government party.
Investors were bullish on the eve of the vote and stocks rallied to a seven-and-a-half-year high, hitting 2,098.21 on the benchmark Karachi Stock Exchange KSE-100. Stocks have risen 85 percent in the past year.
Voters will choose from 7,054 candidates to elect the federal assembly and four provincial assemblies, which were suspended and later disbanded by Gen. Musharraf after he seized power.
Critics say the elections will not bring an end to rule by the military, which has already governed Pakistan for 27 years of its 55-year history.
Branding the elections a sham, they charge that Musharraf has ensured the military a permanent place in the government through constitutional changes and tough electoral restrictions, which have seen the exiled Bhutto and scores of opposition candidates disqualified from the race. Fellow ex-premier in exile, Nawaz Sharif, who was deposed by Musharraf in 1999 and is in Saudi Arabia, is barred from returning to Pakistan until 2010.
Almost 72 million Pakistanis are eligible to vote. It is not compulsory, and voter turnouts have declined in the past four elections, with only 35.9 percent casting ballots in the 1997 elections.
At least three public opinion polls show Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and the 18-month-old pro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) are equal favorites. However, neither is expected to win a clear majority and analysts predict frantic horse-trading and coalition-building after the vote.
The PML-Q has said it would call on allies from the pro-government National Alliance and from among the 2,668 independent candidates to clinch the 172 National Assembly seats needed for a majority. The PPP has said it will form a coalition with Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
