THE performance of religious parties in the 2024 elections has been one of its worst in their electoral history. The last time, the religious parties performed so badly, was perhaps, in the 1999 general elections. In my opinion, the less than desirable performance of the religious parties was, besides other factors, due to the inability of the parties to evolve themselves according to the challenges of the present times. They carried their faith-based narrative and exhortation of an Islamic system of government as a panacea for all our ills. These religious parties did not seem to have specific answers to many of the challenges faced by the people of Pakistan on a daily basis.
The parties did not seem to have convincing solutions to problems like deteriorating economy, inflation, precarious security situation in the country, unemployment and restructuring of our broken education system etc. It seems that Pakistan’s election landscape was not significantly impacted by Taliban government’s presence in Afghanistan.
It was expected that JUI-F would do well in KP and Balochistan. In KP, however, JUI-F’s performance was quite dismal. Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman lost his own seat to Ali Amin Gandapur in D.I.Khan, both of Maulana’s sons as well as a younger brother also lost their seats in the National Assembly. It is, however, noteworthy that Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman won a National Assembly seat from the border district of Pishin in Balochistan, a constituency directly influenced by changes in Afghanistan. Pishin was also considered to be the safest constituency for the Maulana.
As stated earlier, the party did not do as well as was expected of it in KP and Balochistan. Several factors contributed to the party’s less than expected performance. Besides the main reason already dilated upon, factors like internal differences within the party, flawed candidate selection influenced by the favouritism of the leadership and allotment of tickets to close relatives, resulted in the poor showing of the party at the hustings.
—The writer, based in Islamabad, is a former Health Minister of KP.
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