Two of three major parties contest AJK polls without making alliance

ISLAMABAD: Two of the three major contestants fought Thursday’s general elections in Azad Jammu & Kashmir (AJ&K) single-handed without joining hands with any party while the third important player hammered a poll alliance with a force that in its good old days had ruled the State for a number of times.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), which is always opposed to making election alliance, did cobble one together in AJ&K with the Muslim Conference (MC) but in several constituencies, the candidates of two parties were also pitched against each other apart from other contenders belonging to other political parties.

They sponsored joint contenders in 20 constituencies, who included the representatives of the two parties. Of them, twelve hailed from the PTI while eight were the cardholders of the MC.

In at least a dozen constituencies, the PTI and MC fielded their separate nominees, obviously after reaching no agreement on having joint runners. They fought in one constituency each of Mirpur and Neelam and two seats each of Kotli, Punch, Sindhnoti, Muzaffarabad and Jammu.

In seven constituencies, only the PTI sponsored contestants while the MC didn’t, meaning that they agreed which party would have its nominees and the other would’nt. Similarly, in two constituencies, only the MC had its cardholders while the PTI didn’t on the same principle.

How far the election alliance paid dividends to the two parties in terms of winning seats will be clear after the results would be available. While the PTI was a new entrant in AJ&K’s electoral politics, the MC is an old player and has the distinction of ruling the State for several times. But it has its fortunes tremendously waned for the past many years and now it is considered a small party.

The Jamaat-e-Islami, which is active in the AJ&K politics for many decades, had only seven candidates in the run. The Pakistan People’s Party, which ruled the AJ&K during 2011-2016, fielded candidates for all 41 seats. However, it suffered a setback when one of its ticketholders gave up contest for a Mirpur seat, airing complaints against the top leadership of the AJ&K party. It faced a big challenge, principally from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), to keep its government in place for another five years.

The PML-N, which is confident to form government after winning the elections, put up its nominees for 39 seats while it didn’t have any cardholder in two constituencies.

Never before was so much dust kicked up in any AJ&K elections. The campaign was marred with hurling of grave allegations by the leaders of the three main contesting political parties.

PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari ran a forceful campaign by addressing a number of public rallies. He faced no handicap as the PPP leaders had encountered in the 2013 general elections in Pakistan on account of security concerns. His main objective was to pull the PPP out of demoralisation it was beset with after the 2013 polls. Imran Khan kept taking on the PML-N especially on the issue of offshore companies. His priority was to make a mark in the electoral politics of AJ&K.