ecurity has been a constant worry for the state of Pakistan since 2001. However, some political parties seem to have accepted the terror attacks and the precarious security situation as a fact of life. Some others have apparently yet to realise the gravity of the situation.

Ensuring security for all citizens remains a low priority. No wonder, not many parties mention it among the things they want to change once they are voted into power. Instead, they highlight their plans for the economy, housing, and inflation in their manifestos. It is as if the economic prospects are not directly linked to the security situation of acountry. This is strange considering that security issues — terror attacks in particular — have impacted the elections since 2008.

Campaigns for the general elections on February 8 started at a time when the security agencies were engaged in operations to stop terror attacks on security forces in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan. There have been intelligence reports that the terror networks can target important political personalities, election rallies and candidates.

Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam has already expressed concern for security after some of the party’s leaders and candidates were attacked in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. Mohsin Dawar, a former member of the National Assembly and a leader of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement, was ambushed on Wednesday last. He survived because he was using a bulletproof vehicle.

Earlier, in 2022, the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan had released a letter, threatening the PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and the PML-N president Shahbaz Sharif. JUI-F’s Maulana Fazlur Rehman has survived several attacks from 2013 to 2022.

During the last general elections, the country witnessed 18 terror attacks on political personalities and election rallies from May 1 to July 17 that claimed 183 lives. The terrorists killed several candidates during their election campaigns, including Nawabzada Siraj Raisani, a candidate of the Balochistan Awami Party, in Mastung; and Haroon Bilour, a candidate of the Awami National Party, in Peshawar.

In the run-up to the 2013 elections, the TTP virtually crippled the campaigns of Awami National Party, the PPP, and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement. In just three weeks, between April 20 and May 11, the TTP had killed 81 and wounded 473 people in 119 bombing and shooting incidents. Bashir Bilour, a former minister and key ANP leader, was targeted in a suicide bombing when he was campaigning in Peshawar. Former prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani’s son, Ali Haider Gilani, was kidnapped from Multan on the polling day.

There were 18,634 terror attacks in Pakistan between 2002 and 2013.Those killed 52,671 security officials and civilians and wounded 57,344 people.

After Operations Zarb e Azb and Raddul Fassad were launched, the frequency of terrorist attacks dropped significantly. However, in 2022, there was another surge in terror attacks across country. According to a report by the Pakistan Institute for Conflict and Security Studies, the militants carried out 376 terror attacks in 2022, killing 533 people and injuring another 832. The number of attacks showed a 28 percent increase over 2021. The report said that the year 2022 had seen the highest number of militant attacks in five years. For the first time since 2017, the country had faced more than 300 militant attacks in a year. Also, for the first time since 2018, it had suffered more than 500 deaths resulting from terrorist attacks.

The year 2023 was a nightmare. According to a report about the security situation in Pakistan, 854 people were killed or wounded in militant attacks and counterterrorism operations in the first quarter of the year, about half the casualties during the entire 2022. The report said that the 219 terror attacks had killed 358 people and injured 496 in January-March.

As many as 245 (or 68 percent) of the attacks were reported from Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, and 64 from Balochistan (18 percent). The report said that the year 2023 had started with the most fatal January for security forces in a decade, following a similar trend from the previous year, which ended with the decade’s deadliest December for them.

Various reports suggest that the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan, the Baloch Liberation Army and their affiliated groups, and the Islamic State of Khorasan Province (a chapter of the ISIS) were involved in most of the attacks.

The terror networks, especially the Baloch insurgent outfits, including the Baloch Liberation Army, changed their strategy and started targeting Chinese nationals in Pakistan for personal business or CPEC-related activities. They targeted Chinese citizens in Karachi and Balochistan where most of the CPEC activities were taking place. The trend is a matter of grave concern for not only China but also Pakistan.

The menace of terrorism has cost Pakistan dearly. An Economic Affairs Division document released in 2017 reads, “Due to the war in Afghanistan, Pakistan has faced the most serious consequences — from political to security, socio-economic and environmental — over the decades. From hosting millions of refugees to being a major victim of terrorism, the cumulative impact has been enormous, with adverse overall growth rates in all major sectors of the economy. Normal economic and trading activities were disrupted, resulting in higher costs of doing business, including the cost of insurance and significant delays in meeting export orders around the globe. As a result, Pakistani products gradually lost their market share to their competitors. Economic growth could not pick up as planned during the last decade.”

During 2001-2017, the direct and indirect costs incurred by Pakistan due to incidents of terrorism amounted to $123.13 billion.

Political parties and decision-makers have to revisit their priorities and should evolve a clear and consistent policy to improve the security situation for the sake of democracy, a fair election process and a strong economy.

The writer is a senior journalist, teacher of journalism, and analyst