PIPS - Pakistan Institute For Peace Studies (SouthAsiaNet)

SOUTHASIANET

Dated: 16-02-2008

Pakistan’s Troubled Electoral History

PIPS Report

Pakistan has yet to settle several basic constitutional questions. Other than the role of the military in politics, Islam, ethnicity, provincial autonomy and the country’s geo-strategic engagements are some of the dominant themes in ever general elections in Pakistan. In the February 18 election, too, these issues define political battle-lines.

History indicates that, even if polls are somewhat free and fair, the country should brace itself for more turmoil. Elections in Pakistan have always been an occasion of momentous change. Sadly, though, the change is almost always full of violence and tragedy on a grand scale.

The first ever general elections in 1970, after 23 years of independence and organised by another Musharraf-like general Yahya Khan, had set off a gruesome civil war and led to the secession of Bangladesh. The next 1977 election paved the way for General Ziaul Haq, who not only hanged the country’s first elected prime minister, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, but also set in place a programme of state-sponsored Islamisation and jihad. Seven elections later, this year the country is once again at the crossroads to democracy and authoritarianism.

Like most other pre-poll times in the past, the country is shaken to the core by a relentless spree of suicide attacks, other acts of terrorism, insurgencies and crime. The Taliban have resurfaced with a vengeance and taken on many new forms and shapes. The army is fighting two mini-civil wars in the north-western Pashtun belt and in Balochistan. The political landscape is also extremely chaotic and uncertain, marked by a lingering judicial crisis and fears of rigging. So, though the coming election signifies a step forward in the right direction, it will lead the country to another dangerous phase of tests and trials—as, indeed, has every other election in Pakistan.

1970: The Centre Falls Apart

For 23 years after independence in 1947, Pakistan’s military-bureaucratic establishment failed to hold a party-based national general election. As an electoral exercise, the maiden election was a success. Though far from perfect, the 1970 polls are still regarded as the most credible of all. Yet, the vote result reflected the ethnic, constitutional and ideological conflicts which the military and political elite of the country failed to resolve. In East Bengal, the country’s more populous faraway province, the Nationalist Awami League of Sheikh Mujib-ur-Rehman swept the polls and, without winning a single seat in West Pakistan, emerged as the majority party. The ensuing dispute could only be settled by a bloody civil war and India’s military intervention.

The ’70 election also disproved two original myths about the country’s people and politics. The religious parties were soundly trounced in the elections (see Table 1). The Awami League’s counterpart in West Pakistan was the social-democratic Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. All traditional and modern Sunni and Shia parties failed to find electoral any significant following.

Secondly, the election showed that the national identity does not subsume ethnic identities. In fact, when deprived of their democratic rights and suppressed by a strong centre, ethnicity becomes a strong symbol of political identity.

A total of 25 political parties had taken part in the 1970 polls. The left-leaning parties were the Pakistan People’s Party and two factions the National Awami Party. The parties on the other side of the spectrum, believed to be supported by the Yahya regime, included the many factions of the Muslim League and religious parties like the Jamaat Islami (JI), Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (JUP) and Jamiat Ualama-e-Islam (JUI). As the table shows, all these parties lost and, other than the PPP, the Pashtun and Baloch nationalist parties scored significant victories in NWFP and Balochistan. Which explains why the question of provincial autonomy remained a persistent contentious issue in the post-1971 Pakistan as well. On the other hand, religious parties were also able to assert themselves after the 1970 defeat because of the space created by the Islamic provisions of the 1973 constitution.

1977: The Return of the Military

The second general elections in 1977 also yielded tragic results for the country. The PPP rule was marred by strained relations between the centre and the provinces. A military operation against Baloch insurgents and disputes with the coalition of JUI and Pashtun nationalists in NWFP pitted a variety of forces against the PPP in the 1977 elections. The opposition parties formed an electoral coalition, called the Pakistan National Alliance (PNA). This coalition comprised of secular, nationalist and Islamic parties. However, the religious parties soon turned the election campaign into a demand for implementing Nizam-e-Mustafa (Islamic rule).

The turnout in the 1977 National Assembly election was relatively low and more than a dozen candidates had been elected to the parliament unopposed. Pakistan Peoples Party won 155 seats—107 of them in Punjab, 32 from Sindh and six seats in NWFP. The PPP won all seven seats from Balochistan because a boycott by the Pakistan National Alliance. The PNA won only 36 seats. Overall, the PPP gained 77.5 per cent vote against the PNA’s 18 per cent. in the 1977 elections.

The PNA alleged rigging and boycotted the poll for provincial assemblies. The protest movement against Z.A. Bhutto turned into a mass agitation, providing General Ziaul Haq a pretext to stage a coup. The PNA disintegrated immediately after Bhutto was removed from power. The secular parties in the alliance quit as religious parties, especially the JI and JUI, started to dominate the agenda. Soon, the Barelvi JUP also parted ways with the alliance. Most of these political parties as well as the JUI later formed the Movement for Restoration of Democracy (MRD) which launched a campaign against military rule.

Even though the Pashtun Awami National Party (ANP) had initially supported Ziaul Haq and the Baloch nationalists remained largely inactive, the Zia period also saw the worsening of ethnic relations in the country. Because of the PPP’s persecution, signified by Bhutto’s hanging, Sindhi nationalism gained force. During the MRD movement in the early 1980s Sindh was further alienated by the excessive use of force. A new phenomenon of ethnic politics emerged in urban Sindh as the Mohajir (now Muttahida) Qaumi Movement began to represent the Urdu-speaking population of Karachi, Hyderabad and other cities in Sindh. The party-less 1985 elections also encouraged parochial, ethnic parties to advance their agenda as all the major opposition parties including the PPP boycotted the elections held under General Zia.

Zia further damaged the prospects for a functioning federation by vesting more powers in the office of president and making the parliament subservient. He introduced the eighth amendment in the constitution which empowered the president to dissolve elected assemblies, a power which was frequently used by his successors in the presidency.

Moreover, Zia’s policies of jihad in Afghanistan and Islamisation in Pakistan promoted radicalism and sectarianism in society, which has since then gained monstrous proportions.

Elections under Civilian Rule

The 1988 general elections were held by a caretaker government after Zia’s death in a plane crash. This election reactivated the democratic political process that had been stagnant since 1977. To counter the popularity of PPP leader Benazir Bhutto, who had returned from exile, a new anti-PPP alliance under the name of Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI). The Supreme Court has been hearing a case throughout the 1990s on the role played by the ISI, Pakistan’s premier intelligence agency, in setting up the IJI.

There were 46.2 million registered voters in 1988 and the turnout was 43.7 per cent. The PPP won 93 of the 207 National Assembly seats with 38.52 per cent votes. The Nawaz Sharif-led IJI was limited to Punjab. The Jamiat Ulama-e-Islam (Fazlur Rehman) won seven seats without joining any coalition. The success of the JUI was due to the fact that the PPP had not fielded candidates in those constituencies. The National Awami Party (ANP) could win only two seats in 1988 elections.

In 1988, the MQM was a new addition to the parliamentary politics of Pakistan. Its ethnicity-based politics ended JI’s long hold on city politics in Karachi and Hyderabad. The MQM had won 13 NA seats from the urban areas of Sindh and emerged as the third largest party in the National Assembly.

The hope inspired by the 1988 elections that democratic institutions can be developed in Pakistan was dashed soon. The Benazir government could not last more than 18 months as the Muslim League provincial government in Punjab remained at loggerheads with the centre till President Ghulam Ishaq Khan used his presidential powers to dismiss the assemblies.

The caretaker government set up after Benazir Bhutto was deposed on August 16, 1990, consisted of overtly anti-PPP individuals and parties. Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, the interim prime minister, had quit the PPP shortly before the dissolution of assemblies to join the IJI. The caretaker chief minister of Sindh, Jam Sadiq, was an opponent of Benazir Bhutto and Punjab’s caretaker chief minister Ghulam Hyder Wyen was an old Muslim League worker. Mir Afzal Khan, the interim chief minister of NWFP, was a friend of President Ghulam Ishaq Khan.

The general elections of 1990 were a clash between two major alliances—the Nawaz-led IJI and the People’s Democratic Alliance (PDA) led by the ousted prime minister Benazir Bhutto. The former won 105 seats and the latter 44. The PPP alleged that the secret agencies had manipulated the poll results but continued to play the role of opposition in parliament. Other major parties were MQM (15 seats), and the JUI (Fazlur Rehman) and ANP six each.

The IJI had made seat adjustments with the Pashtun nationalist party ANP in NWFP and Jamhoori Watan Party in Balochistan. The Pakistan Muslim League was the largest party in the IJI, and had religious leanings and support for a strong centre. However, much like Benazir Bhutto, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif too had to make alliances with ethnic and religious parties whose political views were entirely opposite.

The Sharif government lasted a little longer than the PPP’s and was ousted by President Ghulan Ishaq Khan in much the same fashion. In the subsequent 1993 elections the Jamaat Islami parted ways with the IJI. The PPP won 89 seats with 7.8 million votes and Nawaz Sharif’s Muslim League (PML-N) 73 seats with 8.1 million votes. The PPP had a vote share of 36.83 percent while the PML (N) got 37.37 percent votes. Other nationalist and religious parties could not perform well in 1993 polls. The Islamic parties gained a mere 1.4 per cent of the total vote.

The second Benazir government was marked by the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan whose patrons in Pakistan, the JUI-F, was in alliance with the PPP. This government, too, could not complete its tenure and the PPP’s own president, Farooq Leghari, turned against the party. Amid a massive wave of sectarian terrorism and soon after the murder of her brother Murtaza Bhutto, Benazir Bhutto was ousted from the Prime Minister House for the second time.

The Sharif-Bhutto cycle took a dramatic turn in 1997. Till then, the two parties had a close competition and they faced strong opposition in each of their respective rules. This time, however, despite the low turnout the PML (N) got 8.8 million votes and 137 seats. The PPP won only 18 seats with 4.2 million votes. The MQM again won 12 seats in urban Sindh while the ANP claimed ten seats in the NWFP. Religious parties failed miserably again and only the JUI (F) won two seats.

The numerical strength of the second Sharif government enabled him to do away with the much-abused sections of the 8th amendment. Although, in 1998, the government took the historic decision of responding to India’s nuclear tests with a series of its own, Nawaz Sharif followed it up with an aggressive Pak-India peace initiative. The normalisation process was thwarted by the battle of Kargil, which brought the two nuclear-armed countries to the brink of war. Differences between General Musharraf and Prime Minister Sharif, especially over Kargil, eventually led the October 1999 coup which ended the last phase of elected constitutional rule in Pakistan.

Elections under Musharraf

After introducing controversial new election rules and regulations, which disqualified a large number of previously elected assembly members, Musharraf organised elections in 2002. More than 70 parties took part in the polls but backed the PML (Quaid-e-Azam), mostly consisting of defectors from the Sharif Muslim League. Both Bhutto and Sharif were in exile.

For the first time in Pakistan’s history, all the major religious parties formed an electoral alliance, Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA), and were able to gain a majority in NWFP and enough seats in Balochistan to get an equal share in the pro-Musharraf coalition government. The alliance also emerged as the main opposition group in the Musharraf-controlled parliament. Much of that advance by the MMA in 2002 was attributed to the American invasion of Afghanistan which had received a strong reaction from the Pashtuns. However, the electoral laws introduced by Musharraf also favoured the MMA as madrasa degrees were given equivalence to a BA. So while thousands of candidates were disqualified for not having a BA degree, candidates of religious parties remained eligible.

The king’s party PML (Q) won 126 seats and, with support from a PPP dissident group, formed the government. The PPP was the second largest party with 81 seats despite Benazir’s absence from the country. Though the PML(Q) claims to be the only party to complete its tenure in government, a look at this period shows that the parliament played the role of a docile sidekick to General Musharraf who continues to govern as an authoritarian autocrat.

Conclusion

Unlike the 1988-99 civilian rule, ethnic parties in the smaller provinces have became restive and alienated during the eight years of Musharraf. Though the question of provincial autonomy continued to simmer without a satisfactory resolution, the Sharif and Bhutto terms gave a sense of participation to nationalist politicians. It is not a surprise that the Baloch insurgency restarted and gained momentum during the Musharraf rule whose tendency to assert the centre’s authority has fuelled the conflict.

The Pashtun areas, too, are under fire. Though it has a radical religious ideology, the Taliban movement in north-western parts of the country is almost exclusively Pashtun. And if the population in tribal areas is being alienated and antagonised by the military attacks in the region, the secular ANP is also at the receiving end of violence, which widens the scope of Pashtun resentment towards the centre.

The murder of Benazir Bhutto will also be a major factor in determining the outcome of this election, especially in Sindh, which has simmered with anger and grief since the December 27 tragedy. Much of it will be directed towards the Punjab-dominated centre and Punjab-based parties are unlikely to do well in the province.

The alliance of religious parties is in disarray. Even in the best of times, the MMA was a fragile and unnatural alliance of mullahs at the opposite ends of the sectarian spectrum. In the run-up to the 2008 elections, the alliance has virtually fallen to pieces with its two main constituents, the JI and JUI-F, in open feud. Other than the JUI-F in the Pashtun belt, MMA parties are not in a position to repeat their 2002 performance. The spectre of terrorism has also diminished the standing of the religious parties, especially in Punjab and Sindh where most of the votes are. Its governance record in NWFP is also under severe criticism, though the JUI-F is likely to retain its premier position among religious parties.

Even as the PPP, fired up after Benazir’s murder, and the PML-N are likely to be the main protagonists in the election, the road ahead is paved with dangers. Assuming that the February 18 election will meet the minimum standards of fairness, the presence of Musharraf will be a tricky matter for any future civilian set-up. The judicial crisis will also be a critical issue. Above all, the violence in Balochistan and tribal areas and the war on terror will demand judicious and decisive action.

Only a representative form of government can adequately deal with the lingering question of ethnicity and the explosive issue of extremism and terrorism. The only lesson that can be learnt from Pakistan’s electoral history is that unless the verdict of the people is fully respected and elections are routinely and regularly held without unconstitutional breaks and mid-term dismissals of elected governments, democracy cannot take hold. But does democracy in Pakistan have a chance under Musharraf?