LAHORE - The recurring terror hits, before election campaigns could pick up, are becoming alarming for political parties, besides being a threat to timely elections.
Reports by the Interior Ministry and agencies say militants or extremist elements are on the prowl looking to target election candidates and political leaders, with the reason being their opposed to the kind of democracy promoted through general elections in Pakistan.
Now that security cover for political leaders and poll candidates has been lifted on instructions from the election commission, a panic has swayed election-related activities confining even the boldest of the politicians and leaders to certain boundaries. As a matter of fact, by this time three main groups have lost their men to terrorist attacks in three provinces: MQM lost its men in Sindh’s Hyderabad district, ANP in two hits in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and PML-N in Balochistan.
As terror fear kept haunting him, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, who leads the main political party PPP, had to break the long tradition of addressing people in the open on the occasion of death anniversary of ZA Bhutto. The Interior Ministry warned former president Pervez Musharraf of being on the hit-list of the militants in addition to marking the spots susceptible to the target.
The game is to wreck the law and order, and thwart the elections by triggering fear through bomb blasts and suicide attacks. Looking at the current pace of attacks and measures adopted to forestall and counter the situation, the chances are higher that the extremist elements may be able to fulfill their designs.
PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif who himself has been denuded of the security cover has found a conspiracy behind the current law and order situation, to sabotage the election process. The PML-N, taking a more personal look at that situation, believes the conspiracy is meant to target it, for it has earned immense popularity and is striking fear of defeat in the mind of the rivals.
The present security is bound to ripe for the election postponement after suspicions are already looming large on the account of certain steps of the election commission, the interim set up; and the process adopted for scrutiny to stop the loans, tax and utility defaulters from contesting the elections as well as to judge their worth strictly on the yardstick of article 62 and 63 of the Constitution.
Given the situation it is incumbent upon the government to formulate a solid and foolproof security policy for election campaigns although it has planned to depute army, rangers, FC, police and others at polling stations on the election day.
The government is also set to recruit more persons for security but more than that it needs to make all stakeholders sit together and formulate a common and solid strategy to be followed by all before the elections. PTI leaders say it has trained thousands of volunteers to guard the party campaign; the issue however does not relate to the PTI alone.
PML-N Central Information Secretary Mushahiddullah Khan has blamed the government for being not sincere about security of the politicians as well as lacking the requisite interest to ameliorate the law and order situation.
He has laid stress on working out a coordinated strategy with the input of all the stakeholders, including the politicians, to keep the situation peaceful and under control before the elections. He says any attempt to disrupt the election process would not be acceptable to his party while postponement of the elections would be disastrous for the country and democracy.