AWAY from Punjab where the election campaign had a more traditional look, it was media that provided the flavour this time round. If nothing else, the adver-tisement campaigns did provide the masses the much needed ‘push’ to go out and vote.

An advertiser who would rather not disclose his name and, indeed, the names of his clients said PPP, PML-N and PTI has spent around Rs1 billion each under the head. “PPP practically carried out its entire campaign using print and electronic media,” said a senior director at the Jang Group.

In a country with about a hundred channels in business, Pakistan Television (PTV) and Geo News attracted massive numbers owing to their respective terrestrial and satellite viewership base. Not far behind were the local cable operators who ran the ads during the movies that they deal in.

The situation in print was not much different. Full-page and half-page ads by leading political parties graced newspaper pages, with Dawn and Jang leading the way despite being the most expensive.

In terms of pre-production, a director working with ARY Digital said the cheapest ads were created by the PPP.

“They used plenty of old footage and the most basic graphics. PML-N. ANP and JI were not fundamentally different, but the slick PTI ads were A-grade productions. Just the fact that Rahat Fatah Ali Khan was used by both PML-N and PTI in interesting even though he charges a minimum of around Rs1 million for a single recording,” he said.

Midas, a Lahore-based advertising agency which handled accounts of most of the major political parties, was unavailable for comments despite repeated attempts.

An interesting aspect that was seen in Karachi and Lahore was the ‘free’ space voluntarily offered to certain political parties by smalltime publications.

“We print free ads now, hoping that in a few months, we shall reap the rewards,” was the reply from the editor of one such paper. Call it investment, if you will.