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| Threatened Bilawal | | Lengthening shadow of poll violence | |
INCREASING incidents of
violence in the run-up to the
May 11 elections in Pakistan have resulted in the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) losing one of its key campaigners, Bilawal Zardari-Bhutto. Where exactly he is hiding is not known, but there is speculation that he has shifted to Dubai and will come back to Pakistan after the elections. He had been frequently receiving threats to his life from extremists, including the Taliban. PPP leaders have admitted that the party cannot afford to risk Bilawal’s life. Now the PPP has no one from the Bhutto family to campaign for its candidates as President Asif Zardari has been restrained through a court order from taking part in the campaigning activity because of the constitutional position he holds.
Poll-related violence has claimed at least 70 lives in the past one month in Pakistan. Among the worst-hit areas are the whole of Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa province, the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), entire Balochistan province and Karachi. Most polling stations in these areas have been declared “sensitive”. Attempts on the life of those involved in campaigning are rising with every day passing. How alarming is the situation can be understood from the fact that the Chief Election Commissioner of Pakistan, Fakhruddin G. Ibrahim, has declared that he may not be able to conduct free and fair elections if foolproof security arrangements are not made in all the violence-prone areas.
At least 70,000 soldiers are likely to be deployed on election duty. Yet people are not sure of their safety on the polling day because the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and many other extremist organisations have warned voters of dire consequences if they tried to exercise their right of franchise. Extremists have issued pamphlets in the villages near Peshawar asking people to boycott polling. Their argument, of course based on ignorance, is that democracy is “not an Islamic system”. The most threatened person in these circumstances is one who has come to be known as “secular”. Perhaps this is one reason why the extremists are baying for Bilawal’s blood. |
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