Pakistan votes in election to test democracy marred by violence, allegations of meddling

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Updated 08 February 2024
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Pakistan votes in election to test democracy marred by violence, allegations of meddling

  • Election comes at a time of heightened tensions between ex-PM Imran Khan and the powerful military
  • At least nine people, including two children, were killed in multiple militant attacks on polling day

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s government on Thursday cut mobile phone services across the country as millions voted in a closely watched general election amid multiple crises, including a surge in militancy, with at least nine people, including two children, killed in militant attacks on polling day. 

Thousands of troops were deployed on the streets and at polling booths across the country as voting started on Thursday morning. Pakistan also temporarily closed its borders with Iran and Afghanistan.

“As a result of the recent incidents of terrorism in the country, precious lives have been lost, [so] security measures are essential to maintain the law and order situation and deal with possible threats,” the Pakistani interior ministry said, barely minutes before voting opened at 8am.

“Hence the decision has been made to temporarily suspend mobile services across the country.”

On Thursday afternoon, five policemen were killed in a bomb blast and firing on a patrol in the Kulachi area of Dera Ismail Khan district in the northwest, authorities said. Another person died in firing on a security forces vehicle in Tank, about 40 km (25 miles) to the north.

In Balochistan, a soldier from a civilian paramilitary force was killed and 10 others injured in over a dozen blasts caused by grenades or improvised explosive devices, Reuters reported, while two children died in a blast outside a women’s polling station.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the assaults though attacks by religiously motivated militant groups like the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) and ethno-nationalist Baloch insurgents have surged in the run-up to the elections in the nuclear-armed South Asian nation of 241 million.

A day before the polls opened, at least 28 people were killed and over 40 were injured in violence in the southern regions of Pakistan, including two separate blasts targeting election candidate offices in the Balochistan province.

Interior minister Dr. Gohar Ejaz said the polling process had gone “smoothly” with few security complaints except in the Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces. 

“We have concerns about them but our police, levies and security forces are performing their duties there very actively,” he told reporters. 

Some analysts in Pakistan see the communication shut down as an attempt to keep opposition voters from getting information or coordinating activities.

“There is a terror wave in the country so if there is any such decision [to shut mobile networks], please see it in that context,” Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaar-ul-Haq Kakar told reporters.

Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, the chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), one of Pakistan’s three largest political parties, called for an “immediate restoration” of cellular networks.

PPP Senator Sherry Rehman later said a petition had been filed with the election commission against the mobile phone service suspension and the party would approach the Islamabad High Court also.

“Our major cities are not classified as sensitive,” Rehman told reporters, saying there was no justification for shutting mobile services across the country.

“PATTERN IS NOT NEW”

The mobile phone network suspension comes as widespread allegations of manipulation and pre-poll rigging have cast a shadow over the general election, a historic event that will mark only the country’s third ever democratic transition of power.

Tensions between civilian politicians, particularly from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party of jailed former Prime Minister Imran Khan, and the powerful military, which has ruled for over three decades of Pakistan’s history since independence in 1947, are running high as millions of Pakistanis went out to vote. The military strongly denies interfering in politics.

Khan was ousted from the PM’s office by a parliamentary vote of no-confidence in April 2022 and has been in jail since August last year, which has angered his millions of supporters. He is also disqualified from running for public office for ten years and faces dozens of legal challenges, including one case in which he is accused of ordering violent attacks on military installations on May 9, 2023, which could entail the death sentence. Last week, he received three back-to-back jail sentences that could see him spend the next three decades in jail. 

In the run-up to the polls, Khan’s PTI also complained of a widening crackdown against the party, including not being allowed to campaign freely, and questions surround the legitimacy of an election that Khan, the main opposition leader and arguably the country’s most popular politician, cannot contest.

Khan’s key challenge is expected to come from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party of three-time former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who returned to Pakistan last year from self-imposed exile to lead the party ahead of national elections.

In the last election in 2018, it was Sharif’s PML-N that widely complained of rigging and manipulation. A year earlier, Sharif had been ousted by the Supreme Court as prime minister and disqualified for life from running for public office. He later left for the United Kingdom after being granted medical bail and declined to return.

But as he came back to Pakistan in October last year, corruption convictions against him evaporated and the bar to contest polls was lifted. The three-time former premier is now widely seen as the frontrunner in elections, with an edge over rivals due to the backing of the military.

Sharif has denied the generals have thrown their weight behind him.

Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja rejected there were any favorites and said elections were being conducted “fairly.”

“Voters will be able to vote freely for their candidates of choice,” he said on Thursday morning.

“MY PRINCE”

But many observers believe the results are predetermined.

“Each time, one party or another has been targeted as the party that must be kept out of power and this time that party is PTI,” Husain Haqqani, a former Pakistani ambassador to the United States and currently a scholar at Washington’s Hudson Institute, told Arab News. “The military usually proceeds by defining an enemy and that enemy right now is Imran Khan.”

“The pattern is not new nor are the [security] establishment’s tactics,” he said, adding that the PTI’s vast social media presence and the celebrity status of its leader were amplifying the controversy more than in the past.

“Pakistan seems stuck with the hybrid model of partial democracy and military intervention. That will not change with this election. The only issue is whether Imran Khan’s popularity will dent the next hybrid regime’s ability to function effectively,” Haqqani added.

Sarwar Bari, National Coordinator at the not-for-profit Pattan Development Organization, said the 2024 election was peculiar in the “very transparent” nature of the manipulation and intimidation taking place.

“In the past, it used to be very subtle,” he told Arab News. “But this is unprecedented, at this level, so intense and widespread rigging, Pakistan’s establishment has broken its record.”

“I have been saying that this election is neither free nor fair,” Bari added, “but it is an absolutely transparent election because whatever is happening is happening in the clear light of day.”

At a polling station in Islamabad, an elderly woman, who declined to be named, said she was voting for “Khan and only Khan.”

“I am voting for the one who is being suppressed,” she told Arab News. “He is my prince, my son.”

But Dr. Goodluck Jonathan, who is in Pakistan to head the Commonwealth Observers mission, said he was “pleased” with election arrangements, and had observed calm at the polling stations he visited. 

“I believe that by the end of the day the people of Pakistan will be happy,” he told reporters. “On Sunday we will give a comprehensive report on this election.”

With additional inputs from Aamir Saeed in Islamabad

 


Moody’s upgrades Pakistan’s credit rating to ‘Caa1’, finance minister hopes for rate cut

Updated 6 sec ago
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Moody’s upgrades Pakistan’s credit rating to ‘Caa1’, finance minister hopes for rate cut

  • Pakistan’s international bonds rose as much as 1 cent to between 90-100 cents on the dollar following ratings upgrade
  • Aurangzeb says more room for central bank to cut key policy rate from 11 percent on back of positive economic indicators

Moody’s said on Wednesday it had raised Pakistan’s credit rating by one notch to ‘Caa1’ from ‘Caa2’ due to an improving external financial position and it assigned the country a “stable” outlook.

The announcement came within hours of Pakistan’s Finance Minister Mohammed Aurangzeb saying there was more room for the central bank to cut the country’s key policy rate from 11 percent on the back of positive economic indicators.

“The credit rating’s improvement is a sign that economic policies are heading toward the right direction,” Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said in a statement.

Pakistan’s international bonds rose as much as 1 cent to between 90 and 100 cents on the dollar following the ratings upgrade. It lifted most of them to their highest since early 2022 when fears of a full-blown debt crisis sent them plunging to as little as 30 cents.

Moody’s decision to raise the rating by one notch after Fitch and S&P did the same will help Pakistan’s capability to raise external debt. Pakistan says its economy is on a recovery path after a $7 billion IMF bailout helped to stabilize it.

“We changed the outlook for the Government of Pakistan to stable from positive,” Moody’s said in a statement.

“The upgrade to Caa1 reflects Pakistan’s improving external position, supported by its progress in reform implementation under the IMF Extended Fund Facility (EFF) program,” it said.

Pakistan’s debt affordability has improved, but remains one of the weakest among rated sovereigns, Moody’s said, adding that the Caa1 rating also reflected the country’s weak governance and high degree of political uncertainty.

Aurangzeb told a gathering of businessmen in Islamabad ahead of the Moody’s announcement that he was expecting an improvement in Pakistan’s credit rating by other agencies after Fitch and S&P.

“We are hopeful of progress in terms of the policy rate going south,” he added.

Aurangzeb said it was his personal view that there was more room for a rate cut toward the end of the year, adding that it was for the central bank to make the final call on the issue. The next policy rate announcement is due on September 15. The central bank left its key interest rate unchanged at 11 percent on July 30, going against analyst expectations. In a Reuters poll they had forecast a reduction of 50 to 100 basis points. The bank said the inflation outlook had deteriorated due to rising energy prices.

Inflation accelerated to 4.1 percent year-on-year in July. 


Pakistan’s central bank sees FY26 growth up to 4.25 percent, trade gap to widen

Updated 20 min 42 sec ago
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Pakistan’s central bank sees FY26 growth up to 4.25 percent, trade gap to widen

  • Current account deficit forecast at 0–1 percent of GDP despite remittance growth
  • Forex reserves projected to reach $15.5 billion by end-December 2025

KARACHI: Pakistan’s central bank on Wednesday projected economic growth of up to 4.25 percent in the current fiscal year but warned the trade deficit would widen, even as reserves are set to climb on the back of steady remittances and foreign inflows.

The forecast comes as Pakistan implements reforms under a $7 billion International Monetary Fund (IMF) program approved in September 2024, which has helped stabilize the currency, ease inflation and restore investor confidence. The IMF deal is tied to fiscal consolidation, energy sector reforms, and measures to boost exports, part of a broader effort to strengthen macroeconomic stability after years of chronic external imbalances.

The economy returned to moderate growth last year, aided by improved agricultural output, lower global commodity prices, and a series of policy rate cuts totaling 1,100 basis points since late 2024. Inflation has eased from record highs, while the rupee has stabilized against the dollar after a crackdown on the illegal currency market.

“With the policy rate kept unchanged at 11 percent in the MPC meetings in June and July, the MPC expects the real policy rate to be adequately positive to stabilize inflation within the medium-term target range,” the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) said in its Monetary Policy Report (MPR) released on Wednesday. 

“In the external account, the MPR expects the trade deficit to widen further and, notwithstanding continued expected growth in workers’ remittances, result in a current account deficit of 0–1 percent of GDP in FY26,” it added.

The central bank said “projected financial inflows, coupled with continued SBP interbank FX purchases, would support further buildup in SBP’s FX reserves, which are projected to rise to $15.5 billion by end-December 2025.”

Economic activity, it said, was “projected to gain further traction, with the impact of the earlier reductions in the policy rate still unfolding,” and real GDP growth was expected to range between 3.25 percent and 4.25 percent in FY26.

The MPR also flagged “potential external and domestic risks to the baseline macroeconomic outlook” and included analysis of the lag in monetary policy transmission, comparisons with global central bank decisions, and the SBP’s use of alternative data and machine learning to fill gaps in labor market and agriculture statistics.
 


Pakistan’s first Islamic digital bank offers 14 percent Independence Day cashback

Updated 29 min 33 sec ago
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Pakistan’s first Islamic digital bank offers 14 percent Independence Day cashback

  • Campaign runs Aug. 13–22 with Rs3,000 cap per customer
  • Cashback credited to accounts within one business day

KARACHI: Pakistan’s first Islamic digital bank is offering a 14 percent cashback on eligible debit card and QR code transactions to mark the country’s 78th Independence Day, in a campaign aimed at promoting cashless and Shariah-compliant payments.

The “Azadi Cashback” promotion, launched by aik, will run from Aug. 13 to Aug. 22 and allow customers to earn up to Rs3,000 ($10.75) in cashback during the period, credited to their accounts within one business day. The offer excludes utility bills, cash withdrawals, peer-to-peer transfers and government payments.

“The cashback is structured as a discretionary gift on the momentous occasion of Pakistan’s 78th Independence Day,” aik said in a statement.

aik, which operates as a digital-only platform, said the promotion supports its mission to provide Riba-free financial services and encourage secure, cashless transactions. It aims to create a banking experience rooted in transparency, ethics and user empowerment.

aik said the Independence Day campaign was part of efforts to “accelerate the adoption of secure digital payments across Pakistan,” combining “convenience with compliance” for users seeking Islamic finance options.

Digital banking is expanding rapidly in Pakistan, driven by high smartphone penetration and government incentives for electronic payments. According to the State Bank of Pakistan, digital retail transactions surged over 50 percent year-on-year in fiscal 2024, with mobile banking emerging as a key growth segment.


India conflict fires up Pakistan’s Independence Day fervor, boosts flag sales

Updated 24 min 44 sec ago
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India conflict fires up Pakistan’s Independence Day fervor, boosts flag sales

  • Flag maker reports sales up by up to 50 percent as households and businesses spend heavily on August 14 decorations
  • Traders say brisk Independence Day buying is lifting markets despite inflation squeezing consumer budgets

KARACHI: Pakistan’s largest flag manufacturer, VIP Flags, is expecting around 50 percent growth in sales this year as the public marks the country’s 78th Independence Day with unusual zeal, fueled by celebrations of victory in the May 2025 conflict with India.

The two nuclear-armed neighbors, which have fought three major wars since 1947, engaged in their deadliest fighting in decades this May. The fighting ended on May 10 after US mediation, with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government declaring victory and saying it had downed at least six Indian fighter jets.

Officials have since linked the conflict’s outcome to the heightened national fervor surrounding August 14 this year, reflected in booming flag markets and sales of other Independence Day paraphernalia.

“Our business, all the businesses have grown 50 percent,” said VIP Flags CEO Nisar Ahmed Sheikh, adding that much of his stock had been sold to marchers rallying in support of Pakistan’s armed forces during the war with India.

VIP Flags manufactures flags for domestic customers, the armed forces, and international buyers in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, and holds Guinness World Records for the largest flags made in 2004 and 2008.

Sheikh said sales this year would likely run into millions of units.

“Obviously when people were filled with passion [after the war with India] and started hoisting flags, the flags business saw an uptick and increased compared to last year,” he told Arab News. 

“It is still growing and people are putting flags on their cars, bicycles and motorcycles.”

Sheikh said the surge in sales extended well beyond flags, with market vendors incorporating Independence Day themes into a wide range of products — from shirts, mufflers and headbands to shawls, dresses and children’s clothing — creating a vibrant festive atmosphere.

“People must be spending billions of rupees on this (celebrations) and this spending boosts the economy,” the CEO said. 

In Pakistan’s commercial hub of Karachi ahead of Aug. 14, large and small flags adorned vehicles, houses and office buildings, alongside buntings and night-time illuminations. Meanwhile, federal and provincial governments are holding daily events, with top officials like the prime minister and army chief expected to attend ceremonies in Islamabad on Aug. 13 and 14.

“The last time we saw such a show of national zeal on Independence Day was in Zia’s time,” Sheikh said, referring to former military ruler Zia-ul-Haq. “We see people decorating their houses, vehicles and vicinities with flags and buntings and badges.”

Abdul Wahab, a finisher at one of Sheikh’s factories, said he expected at least a 25 percent income increase this season. 

“We are seeing a rush in the market because of this war we recently fought with India,” said the 26-year-old, who plans to work overtime to meet demand.

For lawyer Bad-e-Saba, the occasion was a chance to pass on a message to the next generation.

“The war we recently won against Hindustan is a matter of great pride for us. We want to convey it to our children so they could know where we are standing against our enemy,” she said.

“We want to tell our enemies that we can take good care of our country and our next generation will do it better.”


Pakistan seeks Gulf, regional backing for global plastics treaty at Geneva talks

Updated 13 August 2025
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Pakistan seeks Gulf, regional backing for global plastics treaty at Geneva talks

  • Climate minister meets delegations from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and others on sidelines of INC-5.2 session
  • Talks focus on circular economy, resource mobilization for developing nations hit hardest by plastic pollution

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has stepped up engagement with Gulf and regional partners on a planned global plastics treaty, holding talks with senior officials from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and other states at high-level negotiations in Geneva this week, the ministry of climate change said on Wednesday.

The discussions took place during the Fifth Session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on Plastic Pollution (INC-5.2), part of ongoing UN-led efforts to produce the first legally binding international agreement to curb plastic waste. Negotiations have drawn wide participation from governments, industry and civil society, with particular focus on measures to reduce plastic production, boost recycling, and address the mounting environmental and economic costs of plastic pollution.

Pakistan has positioned itself as a voice for developing countries in the talks, stressing the need for fairness, financial support and technology transfer to help poorer nations tackle the crisis. Gulf states, several of which are major petrochemical producers, are seen as key stakeholders in shaping the treaty’s scope and implementation, both as plastic producers and as potential investors in recycling and waste-management infrastructure.

“The discussions focused on advancing cooperation for a fair and effective Global Plastics Treaty, promoting circular economy solutions, and mobilizing resources to address the disproportionate impacts of plastic pollution on developing countries,” the Pakistani climate ministry said in its statement after Climate Minister Dr. Musadik Malik held an interactive briefing with delegations from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kazakhstan, Iran, Azerbaijan, Algeria, and Kuwait.

The ministry said the engagements “formed part of Pakistan’s broader diplomatic outreach to build consensus and strengthen partnerships for equitable global environmental action.”

The second part of the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment (INC-5.2), opened on Aug. 12 in Geneva. The session aims to finalize and approve the text of the agreement and forward it for consideration and adoption at a future Diplomatic Conference of Plenipotentiaries.

INC-5.2 takes place from 5 – 14 August, follows INC 5, which took place in November/December 2024 in Busan, Republic of Korea. 

“Plastic pollution is already in nature, in our oceans and even in our bodies. If we continue as on this trajectory, the whole world will be drowning in plastic pollution – with massive consequences for our planetary, economic and human health,” said Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP. “But this does not have to be our future. Together, we can solve this challenge. Agreeing a treaty text is the first step to beating plastic pollution for everyone, everywhere.”

“We are here today to fulfil an international mandate. This is a unique and historic opportunity for the international community to bridge differences and find common ground. It is not just a test of our diplomacy— it is a test of our collective responsibility to protect the environment, safeguard human health, enable sustainable economies, and stand in solidarity with those most affected by this plastic pollution crisis,” said Luis Vayas Valdivieso, Chair of the INC.