People across Pakistan have come out to exercise their democratic right to vote in the parliamentary elections, despite two bomb blasts and sporadic violence near some of the polling stations.
Today’s election will mark the first time in Pakistan’s 66-year history that one democratically elected parliament will have followed another. Pakistan is voting to elect a new national assembly and four provincial assemblies, which will then select a new prime minister and provincial chiefs to govern the country.
Pakistan’s young population means that this election is the first time many of the population has voted, adding to the optimistic excitement across the country. Women are also turning out in large numbers, with some reports of polling stations where women’s queue is twice as long as the men’s despite some conservative clerics telling the women that they had no right to vote.
There have been a number of reports of violence around polling stations around the country, and two bomb blasts. Militant groups have warned the public to stay at home and threatened violence, but voters appear undeterred. Pakistan has closed its borders with Afghanistan and Iran and more than 600,000 security personnel including 50,000 troops have been deployed to maintain the peace and protect voters.
These elections have been marred by violence with more than 130 people killed in recent weeks, with one bomb in Karachi, a centre of violence during the campaign, reported to have killed ten and injured dozens more earlier today. Seven people were injured in Peshwar when a “motorcycle bomb” exploded outside a polling station, and there was another explosion reported in Quetta.
The militants have been targeting the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), the Karachi-based Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM), and the Awami National Party (ANP), which forced those parties to reduce their campaigning in some areas. The campaigns of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Imran Khan’s Tehreek-e-Insaf (Movement for Justice) have managed to avoid much of the violence.
