PM defends Pakistan’s political system

Says voters exercised their constitutional right without any hindrance on Feb 8

ISLAMABAD:

Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar has said that voters in the currently held general elections exercised their constitutional rights, and generally, they voted for their favorite candidates despite security challenges.

“It is the beauty of a vibrant democracy, and in Pakistan, it is a transformational democracy, also a brave democracy, considering the security challenges,” he said in an interview with the Turkish broadcaster TRT.

To a question, he said the next parliament would decide to hand over the power to that party which would meet the required magical number to form the new government.

The prime minister said their responsibility as a caretaker government was to ensure security, and ahead of the elections, two terrorist incidents in Balochistan province occurred, which reminded the people of the real-time threat.

The government always had more responsibility when it came to security, he added.

Responding to a question about the suspension of the mobile services, he said to face the security challenge, they had to block the communication channels; otherwise, they did not have any political motive whatsoever.

Elaborating his viewpoint, he said that considering that the terrorists would confine themselves to these two provinces would be a fallacy, there might be other potential attacks in other provinces.

He said they did their best to secure the country. It was only mobile services that were suspended while the internet service was available. He did not think that this suspension had hindered the huge democratic exercise.

Read: PTI secures two-thirds majority in NA, claims Imran

The results showed that it was, by and large, a free and fair exercise.

The caretaker prime minister said that even though people went out and peacefully exercised their right to vote, for the time being, he didn’t have figures as to how many people had voted.

Probably it would have been a record, which meant that everyone was allowed and their votes were counted. So else was democracy, he added. Two provinces were badly hit by terrorist attacks but people came out and bravely voted for their candidates, which was quite unusual, he opined.

He said, “The people of Pakistan are quite brave; they came out and voted.”

To a query regarding change in previous governments, he said there were perceptions and realities, and in the last two decades, the change in governments, like in post-2002, happened on the floor of the parliament.

The vote of no confidence against the previous PTI’s government was passed on the floor of the house with 179 votes, he added.

“So how can anyone call it an undemocratic exercise and intervention from outside forces?” he said, adding that even when Imran Khan was elected, people called it a product of a so-called selection process. But the reality was that he (Imran Khan) was elected with the support of 179 members of parliament, he added.

The prime minister said that the people were unfair in their criticism of Pakistan’s political system. “Political parties and the parliament are the biggest stakeholders in this whole exercise of statecraft arrangements,” he asserted.

APP