The results of Pakistan’s general election
Pakistan’s 2024 general election has sent the country into turmoil as the currently-imprisoned Prime Minister Imran Khan and his party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), won decisively despite significant repression.
The PTI was essentially barred from running in this year’s election, prompting many candidates to run as independents while maintaining alliance with their party. In a stunning upset, these candidates secured 93 out of 266 available seats, forcing a coalition out of a lack of parliament majority.
More recently, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) have succeeded in forming a coalition that keeps the former prime minister out of power, essentially forcing the aligned independents towards the opposition. With protests and efforts to overturn the election results, however, there is little certainty that the situation will alleviate any time soon.
In an election that was expected to be very low-turnout, not many expected such a decisive victory in favor of the PTI. Numerous efforts were implemented to dissuade candidates from running in the election: some were jailed, and the party was prevented from using their electoral symbol, a cricket bat — symbolic of Imran Khan’s past as a cricket star.
Khan was ousted from the government in April 2022, and arrested in May of that year. He and his party’s relations with the military have strained heavily during this time; notable due to the deeply intertwined relationship between the military establishment and the government in Pakistan. His decisive victory, then, is a sound rejection of the military’s investment in politics — especially after supporters of the PTI led violent protests against what they believed was the unfair ousting of the prime minister.
The new coalition, then, must reckon with a force they have previously tried incredibly hard to suppress.
One of the country’s most popular politicians, Khan and the PTI’s populist platform initially enjoyed the support of the military upon first rising to power. They had benefitted from such a relationship when retaliating against their political opponents, to the point where the PML-N and PPP had claimed that the PTI’s 2017 election was the product of military interference.
Yet the tides had turned when these opponents now sought to oust Khan from office by any means. The relationship Khan had with the military soured; however, what made this tension distinctly different was the prime minister’s often public rebuttals of the military; where claims that a national conspiracy against him have led supporters to attack outposts and violently protest.
His May arrest regarding the leak of classified state secrets has led to Khan’s imprisonment for 10 years; so it is impossible for him to hold a position of power at this very moment. Nonetheless, it is an understatement to say that Pakistanis are dissatisfied with the government, regardless of who is in power.
Pakistan has been the subject of an ongoing economic crisis over the last few years, staying afloat from a $3 billion emergency loan from the International Monetary Fund. As of June 2023, the country’s total debt has amounted to $223.86 billion dollars, nearly 75% of total GDP. The current funding is a short-term solution that requires the country to adjust their macroeconomic policy in order to stabilize the Pakistani rupee. The degree of political instability is a contributing factor to the uncertainty over the economy’s future — according to a Gallup poll prior to the election, 70% of Pakistanis surveyed claimed economic conditions in the area they lived in were getting worse, a record-high.
The coalition formed between the PML-N and PPP will have much work to do to quell fears about the economy, military, and level of instability that has arisen post-election. With the PTI holding protests to alleged rigged results, the situation throughout the country will be one to monitor going forward. Yet even without the riots, the outlook towards Pakistan’s future is bleak. It is clear that Pakistani society is ready for a change — whether that be through sound rejection of the military or else.
