‘Daily Show’ on rigged elections in Pakistan
[Musharraf won with] 98%? I think oxygen’s approval rating is only 94%… So on the downside, Pervez Musharraf has subverted the will of the Pakistani people. But on the upside, the will of the Pakistani people has subverted.
on Tuesday, October 9th, 2007, 10:53 am in Daily Show, Pakistan, Video clips › 
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Manish, I didn’t think this was one of Jon Stewart’s better pieces. Neither the Columbus issue nor the Musharraf election are set up properly, and the silly meaningless laughter is a little grating, especially if coming from a live audience, at no discernible comedic or ironic point.
Musharraf was elected in an indirect election, in an electoral college where he could claim 100% of the votes. So that is the surprize, that he didn’t get 100%, not that he got 98%. (The supporters of the two other candidates - Justice Wajihuddin and Makhdoom Fahim - had either resigned or abstained, so the few votes that the Justice got also came from Musharraf’s party, the PML-Q).
I think the present denouement in Pakistan, while re-electing Musharraf, also weakens the electoral role of the Army in the medium and long term, and strengthens civil society, judiciary and the political parties. To that extent, the outcome is not all bad.
Just wanted to add that - as far as the actual mechanics of the election itself went - transparency was carried to extraordinary lengths. Not only was each voting member of the electoral college televised live as they cast their vote, but the ballot box itself was also transparent!
So this was no ordinary rigged election. Any rigging occured back in 2002, when the assemblies were elected, and when the constitution was meddled with, to allow Musharraf, specifically, to run for President while in uniform.
Musharraf just arrested hundreds of opposition members and had the courts bend the constitution to allow his candidacy in the last couple of weeks, so rigging is alive and well.
Chachaji,
C’mon now. Pakistan is a nation where if a “President” ends his/her term, it ends in death or the person has to leave the country (never to come back, if he/she wants to live). To make matters worse, for this “election” one of the candidates was the military dictator who is chief of armed forces. To take such an “election” seriously is prepostrous.
I would have more respect if the Pakistani dictator actually ran in a real election and then rigged it. He is not even trying :-)
Remember when Musharraf “pardoned” AQ Khan for running “Nukes r Us”?? They just made that rule up. (”Janab, suna hai Amreeka me president pardon kar dete hai“) I think that was hillarious.
Manish,I don’t want to defend Musharraf particularly much.
Still to the extent facts matter - I think the opposition leaders who were arrested recently, were arrested on a law-and-order basis, not on a political basis, and they were let off soon after. ‘Hundreds’ is probably an exaggeration, and they were more civil society than political leaders. It’s not like he arrested political people and prevented then from voting or campaigning or anything. Not this time anyway.
Whether the Supreme Court was bent is a very interesting discussion. I don’t think it was. An unnecessarily long hearing was held, and then the petition was dismissed without judging its merits. I actually think the particular point sub judice may very well have been something they did not have jurisdiction over.
But they did assert themselves by holding a long hearing. Of course the lawyers were disappointed that they didn’t go even further by judging in their favor. Instead, they punted to the Election Commission, whose hands were tied because the regulations were altered specifically in Musharraf’s favor recently.
So anyway - this may be rigging, but it is no ordinary rigging. I still think the Army in Pakistan’s politics has been weakened, and if politicians, the media, civil society, and judiciary play their parts well, liberal democratic forces will end up stronger.
RC, yes, the pardon thing may have been made up on the spot. ButI think that episode is not over yet, Bhutto has indicated she might allow IAEA to interview AQK.
hi Manish,
is your “email this” link working? everytime i click it, i can’t figure out how to email the posts.
Pretty transparent. That’s the casus belli which all dictators use to imprison their political opponents on the eve of an election. Musharraf doesn’t seem to mind when his Islamist activist political allies march and create disturbances.
TJ, try it now.
it works! thanks!