Pakistan’s electoral officials will decide on Tuesday whether to go ahead with a January poll in a nation plunged into crisis by the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. Bhutto’s killing in a suicide attack on Thursday has stoked bloodshed across the country and rage against President Pervez Musharraf, casting doubts on nuclear-armed Pakistan’s stability and its transition to civilian rule.
Pakistani stocks fell around 4.7 percent in early trade on Monday as Bhutto’s assassination had investors worried that political instability could damage the $145 billion economy. The markets had been closed for three days of mourning.
The death toll from violence since Bhutto’s killing has reached 47. A former ruling party official said the election scheduled for January 8 was likely to be delayed for up to two months.
But Bhutto’s party vowed to take part, and the opposition party led by former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif would too, said its chairman Raja Zafar-ul-Haq. Election Commission secretary Kanwar Dilshad said provincial governments and election commissioners were told to submit reports on the situation by Monday evening. A decision on whether to postpone the parliamentary election aiming to shift Pakistan from military to civilian rule would be taken on Tuesday, Dilshad said.
The commission said on Saturday its offices in many districts in Sindh province in the south of the country had been burned and voting material including electoral rolls destroyed. "All records have been burnt. All electoral rolls have been burnt. Offices of all returning officers have been burnt," Dilshad said on Monday, referring to 10 offices in Sindh. Security fears in two north western regions also raised doubts about voting there, it said.
"Despite this dangerous situation, we will go for elections, according to her will and thinking," said Bhutto’s widower Asif Ali Zardari, made co-chairman of the PPP party with their son Bilawal, from the Bhutto home in Naudero in southern Pakistan. However, the official of the former ruling party backing Musharraf said: "It seems more than likely that elections will be delayed." Bhutto had hoped to win power for a third time in the January vote though analysts expected a three-way split between her, Nawaz Sharif’s party and the party that backs Musharraf.
Major Pakistani cities stirred back to life on Monday for the first time since Bhutto’s assassination, emerging from the unrest that had paralyzed trade and commerce. The biggest city Karachi, a virtual ghost town at the weekend after rioters went on a rampage burning shops, banks and cars began to get back to work. Banks and shops rolled up shutters, cars and motorcycles returned to the streets and some petrol pumps opened for business after a three-day shut-down.
But there were none of the usual traffic jams in the bustling city of 14 million people, where schools were still closed and many workers remained at home four days after Bhutto was slain. Life is gradually returning to normal.