The Dust Settles, Somewhat
It is only now beginning to dawn on the people of Pakistan that despite themselves they have managed to pull off somewhat of a miracle by not even giving a “heavy” (Mian Nawaz Sharif-type) mandate (10% of the available vote) to any of the political parties. With the Election Commission reporting 40% plus of voting percentage, PML (Q) and PPP-P got almost an equal number of votes, nobody got more than 10% of votes that could be cast. Claiming a “revolution” to anyone who will listen, MMA’s vote tally amounts to a grand 4%. The number of seats does not truly reflect the reality on the ground in the “first-past-the-post-system”. The MMA constituent parties got almost the same number of votes they normally get in any general election, this time their votes were counted together in a Qazi engineered “alliance”. With the main PML split into PML (Q) and PML (N), and both PPP and ANP also split in NWFP, MMA swept them aside in close races. A low turnout in any election always helps the more organized political machine, whose rank and file is more likely to turn out to vote en masse. The anti-American factor helped solidify the MMA vote in the border areas of NWFP and Balochistan but not as overwhelmingly as given out to be. Maulana Fazlur Rehman of JUI (F) may strut his stuff as a potential PM but with less than 60 votes (including the ones reserved for women) in the National Assembly out of 340, or less than 20%, Maulana Sahib’s expectations are rather over-ambitious. At best his posturing is a bargaining position, meant to get maximum benefit for himself, his party and the alliance, MMA, and in that order. As a close ally of Ms Benazir, he managed that to his benefit in the last PPP regime.
