October 4, 2002	Friday	Rajab 26, 1423

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ISLAMABAD, Oct 3: About 50.2 per cent of the prospective voters believe that Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif should be allowed to contest the elections, while 49.8 per cent think otherwise.

These findings were made public by Pattan Development Organization national coordinator Sarwar Bari at a press briefing here on Thursday.

The findings were based on a research study, titled “voters perspective: election 2002”, carried out by Pattan. Over 6,000 voters and 300 candidates were interviewed for the study. Both qualitative and quantitative research tools were applied to ascertain depth of issues.

Sponsored by the Department for International Development, UK, it covered about 50 National Assembly constituencies all over the country.

Barrister Mohammad Sarwar, a legal expert, and Jameel Umer, an IT specialist, were also present on the occasion.

The researchers also studied political trends as reported by four leading newspapers of the country. The report is based on systematic random methodology.

The survey also showed that an overwhelming majority of prospective voters considered the political parties and politicians equally responsible for failure of democracy in the country and termed poverty as the main issue confronted by the candidates.

About 17.9 per cent of those interviewed said they would vote for the People’s Party Parliamentarians, making it the most popular party in the October 10 elections. Around 12 per cent said they would vote for the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz), while a majority of the voters, about 29 per cent, refused to talk about their party affiliation.

Despite the fact that Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif are out of the electoral race, about 21.6 per cent prospective voters favoured the former and 10.3 per cent favoured the latter for prime ministership. A significant 29 per cent voters named little-known persons for prime ministership in their respective constituencies.

President Gen Pervez Musharraf was the top choice for next president with 58.9 per cent votes. He was the also the top choice in province wise breakup also.

According to the breakup of NA constituencies, randomly selected as samples, voters from eight in the NWFP, four in Balochistan, 27 in the Punjab and 10 in Sindh were interviewed by the NGO to get their views regarding different aspects of the forthcoming election. The voters were selected from a list issued by the election commission.

An interesting outcome of the survey was that the majority of the perspective voters perceived the electoral process as free and fair. About 22.1 per cent said they did not have identity cards — a major impediment in casting their votes.

Mr Bari, while briefing the journalists, said about 79.8 per cent of those interviewed replied in affirmative when asked if they would vote in the elections, which was a significant turnaround from the prevailing dull political environment throughout the country. “The figures include 85.5 per cent men and 74 per cent women,” he added.

About the fate of corrupt politicians, 56 per cent respondents said it should be decided by the court of law, while 39.4 per cent said it was the voters’ right to decide about a corrupt politician.

Barrister Sarwar said some of the laws were selectively being applied by the government, casting doubt about the transparency of the electoral process. Institutional capacity and political will on the part of politicians was lacking, he added.

He said the politicians should, in conformity with their legal right, defend the matter in the court of law to, at least, publicize it and make the public aware of the government’s partisan approach.