THE Lowari rail tunnel and a number of other projects launched on the directives of President Pervez Musharraf in Chitral won votes for the Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) in the February 18 elections.

The decisive votes for the King's party in the National Assembly constituency, NA-32, came from the Mastuj subdivision, mostly from the valleys of Yarkhun and Laspur. The subdivision's one provincial assembly seat also went to the Musharraf-backed party.

Prominently displaying the portraits of the president, the PML-Q candidates reminded the voters of the 'favours' Mr Musharraf had done for the Chitralis by launching the gigantic Lowari tunnel project, constructing vital roads and writing off small loans of Zarai Tarqiati Bank (ZTBL) to the farmers.

The PML-Q also cashed in on the MMA government's dismal performance and dissent in the local leadership of the PPP over allotment of ticket.

The Pakistan People's Party not only lost the National Assembly seat for the fifth consecutive time but also saw its votes further slumping by 4 per cent compared to the 2002 elections. When the party won the seat in 1988, it had polled 55 per cent of the total votes cast which also dropped to 20.9 per cent this year.

Shahzada Mohiuddin of the PML-Q won the National Assembly seat by scoring 33,236 votes against 30,961 votes of Sardar Mohammad Khan, an independent candidate. The PPP's Shahzada Ghulam Mohiuddin trailed behind with 18,717 votes, while 2,679 votes went to MMA's Jehangir Khan (withdrawn) and 697 to Nadir Khwaja, another independent.

Out of the 197,022 registered voters, 89,449 used their right of franchise showing a turnout of 45.40 per cent.

Both the former MMA members of the NWFP Assembly belonging to JUI-F lost to the PPP and PML-Q candidates. In PF-89 Chitral-1, PPP's Saleem Khan defeated Maulana Abdul Rehman by a narrow margin of 622 votes. The JUI-F candidate got 12,322 votes. The turnout remained 45.34 per cent, as 52,393 votes were polled out of a total of 115,531.

In PF-90 Chitral-II, the former MPA, Jehangir Khan lost to PML-Q's Ghulam Mohammad who got 13,570 votes against 12,985 votes of the MMA nominee. There were 81,491 registered votes in the area out of which 37,635 were polled and the turnout remained 46.18.