A major upset occurred yesterday when the PPP candidate Qadir Mandokhel narrowly defeated PMLN's Miftah Ismail (whom I personally like and favored, because he is from my community). However, the winning candidate is also likable, being a professor and a social worker in the locality. This, by the way, is the same constituency where a fraudster (Faisal Vawda) won by a narrow margin against Shahbaz Sharif in the massively rigged 2018 elections. At sthat time, the Election Commission flouted all the rules and refused a recount, and if it does so this time as well, people will very likely believe that the establishment has rigged this time as well. And there is plenty of evidence that in fifteen polling booths, there has been rigging.
Which makes me think, it isn't so difficult to rig elections. In 2018, it was the soldiers and police which "persuaded" people to cast their votes for Imran Khan. Yesterday it was the Sindhi cops and presiding officers who indulged in rigging.
But whether rigging happened or not, one thing is clear: the PTI can't survive long. In the past ten bye-elections, it has been able to win only one, and yesterday it trailed behind the PPP, the PMLN and even the banned TLP. It also proves that it won the 2018 elections with the massive support o f the military and the establishment, so it really is a "selected" government.
I do think it's good that the constituency has finally got someone in the PPP to represent them in the national assembly. Let's hope the ruling PPP in Sindh finally spends some of Karachi's huge taxes to improve conditions in Baldia, assuming of course that Imran Khan releases Sindh's share of taxes to the province (which doesn't seem likely).
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