Pakistan's senate election is a high-stakes game
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The recent leak of a video showing some members of a provincial Assembly receiving stakes of cash in exchange for their votes in the 2018 Senate elections has once again raised questions about the legitimacy and credibility of the country’s legislative body.
This is not the first time that Pakistan’s Senate elections have generated such intense debate over their transparency, but the release of secretly shot videos just weeks before the voting has made the issue more serious. Prime minister Imran Khan claimed billions of rupees have exchanged hands for the buying and selling of votes.
In a controversial move, the government has struck down secret balloting for the Senate elections scheduled to be held next month through a presidential ordinance amid reports of possible defection from the ruling party’s ranks. The action came after the government failed to garner the opposition’s support for an amendment in the constitution to change the rule. Now it’s left to the Supreme Court to act as arbiter in yet another constitutional matter that should have been resolved by parliament.
Pakistan Senate elections are held indirectly and four legislative assemblies elect members from their provinces. Each province has an equal number of representatives. The elections are taking place for half the house of 104 members. With less chances of defection in open balloting, the ruling PTI is expected to emerge as the single largest party in the Upper House.
The opposition parties, which have formed an alliance under the banner of Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) have agreed to put up joint candidates. That will make it difficult for the PTI to gain extra seats. In this situation the power matrix in the Senate is not likely to change. The ruling coalition led by the PTI is desperately looking to get a majority in the Upper House but a combined opposition can block its bid to control both houses of the parliament.
Interestingly, all political parties have been critical of secret voting that has made the buying and selling of votes easy-- yet are not willing to come together to change it. The government’s confrontationist policy has made it much more difficult to build a bipartisan consensus to change the rule that requires a two third majority in both houses of the parliament.
Merely replacing secret voting with a show of hands does not present an answer to the broader questions about the credibility of the process.
Zahid Hussain
In 2016, a committee of the whole in the Senate had recommended several reform measures including open balloting for Senate elections but no step was taken by parliament to change the rules. The 2018 Senate elections were perhaps the most tainted in recent years.
The leaked videos showed some members of the Khyber Pakhtukhawa (KP) assembly belonging to the PTI receiving money for their votes. What allegedly happened in that Senate elections was yet another example of how money can change the outcome. The PTI expelled some 20 members of the KP Assembly who allegedly sold their votes to rival candidates. It set a good example but other parties failed to act against the defectors in their own ranks.
It’s not just about money buying votes; in some cases a different outcome to the one expected is also caused by revolt within the ranks against the selection of candidates by party leaders. All-powerful party heads mostly handpick candidates. Cronies are accommodated in the house.
Loyalties shift overnight and one is not surprised to see deserters come back to the house under a different party banner. Money can buy party tickets or a seat even in the legislature. There are instances where several members of one family have been in the Senate as well as the National Assembly.
Politics is a high-stakes game in Pakistan that only a few can afford to play. There is certainly a need to reform the entire Senate election process to restore the public’s faith in democracy. Merely replacing secret voting with a show of hands does not present an answer to the broader questions about the credibility of the process.
Apart from the allegations of horse-trading, a major issue that has contributed to making the system less credible is that the Senate is not truly representative of the people of this country. It has been noted that indirect elections make it easier for people with financial resources to get into the upper house that represents the federation.
Clearly, indirect elections facilitate people with resources to gain entry into the august house. There is a suggestion to hold Senate elections directly as in the case of National and provincial assemblies. More importantly, it is for the political parties to end corrupt practices within their ranks. Unfortunately while crying foul, political leaders are still not willing to reform the system and make their party more democratic.
– Zahid Hussain is an award-winning journalist and author. He is a former scholar at Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholar, USA, and a visiting fellow at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, and at the Stimson Center in Washington DC. He is author of Frontline Pakistan: The struggle with militant Islam (Columbia university press) and The Scorpion’s tail: The relentless rise of Islamic militants in Pakistan (Simon and Schuster, NY). Frontline Pakistan was the book of the year (2007) by the WSJ.
Twitter: @hidhussain
