LAHORE, Sept 4: Electioneering for the October polls remains a low-key affair in the provincial capital as the PPP, the PML-N, the PML-QA and the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal scramble to make seat adjustments with one another.
While the leadership and candidates await the final outcome of their efforts for electoral adjustments before beginning campaign for the polls, the harsh and unprecedented restrictions placed on electioneering promise to make the general elections a lacklustre affair.
The absence of former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif from the electoral race would further dampen the campaigns of the PPP and the PML-N, respectively.
There is no or little sign of the electioneering almost in the streets of the city because of lack of mass mobilization effort by the political parties. Even the door-to-door mass contact drive is yet to pick momentum.
“The electioneering is going on. But it’ll become visible only after the expiry of the last date of withdrawals,” provincial PPP president Qasim Zia told Dawn.
The government lifted the 34-month ban on political activities from September 1. However, except for small-scale protests on the rejection of the papers of Benazir Bhutto or some corner meetings by the candidates, no major activity has taken place in the city nor any is planned for the next few days.
None of the parties have applied for the public meetings at the places notified by the district government for the purpose on September 1.
The most vocal figure seeking votes not for himself but for “the clean leaders who would continue the reforms of the present regime” is Lahore City District Nazim Mian Amer Mahmood. He is speaking at corner meetings and doing whatever he can to mobilize voters for the PML-QA.
Sources say both the PML-N and the PPP are making new plans to win over voters’ sympathy because of the ouster of the main vote- pullers Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif from the race.
“Previously the presence of Benazir and Nawaz was considered enough to seek public support and these were the leaders who used to lead the campaigns of their respective parties throughout the country. But now we would have to make plans to fill the gap caused because of their absence from the country,” a PML-N leader said.
The MMA too has not been able to hold any public meeting so far anywhere in the country. Its main activity has been the train march from Rawalpindi to Lahore. It plans to undertake second phase of train march from Saturday. A MMA spokesman said the alliance would outmanoeuvre all the restrictions on public meetings and rallies.
He said component parties of the MMA were holding corner meetings and were contacting their voters without any hurdle.