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Pakistan Opposition Parties Predict Election Wins

By Barry Newhouse
Islamabad
18 February 2008

Pakistan's opposition parties are predicting strong gains in national and provincial elections today. VOA's Barry Newhouse reports from the capital Islamabad that voter turnout in major cities picked up in the afternoon after a slow start.

President Pervez Musharraf Monday urged voters to participate in the national and provincial elections. Local media reported morning turnout was light in Pakistan's cities, but picked up in the afternoon.

After casting his vote in Rawalpindi, the president told state television that he wants all parties to end the confrontational politics that have gripped the country in recent months.

Mr. Musharraf said he is ready to work with whatever parties win the election and whoever becomes the country's new prime minister.

The president has said he believes lawmakers allied with his PML-Q party will win a majority of seats, despite recent surveys that indicate opposition parties have the strongest support.

Voters are choosing lawmakers for seats in Pakistan's national assembly as well as the four provincial assemblies.

Farzana Raja is a national assembly candidate for the Pakistan People's Party in Punjab - the country's most populous province and the most politically influential.

Speaking to VOA from her polling station about 100 kilometers from Islamabad, she said if the election results do not match pre-poll surveys that favored her party, it would be considered an indication the vote was rigged.

"The latest surveys of IRI, BBC surveys, show that the Pakistan People's Party is the largest political party in the coming polls," she said. "In this situation, if the results are opposite to that people will feel that the elections are rigged."

Election officials have denied there is a plan to rig the vote in favor of lawmakers allied with President Musharraf's party.

But simmering politically motivated violence in recent months has raised concerns about how opposition parties will respond if they believe the election was rigged.