ISAS Briefs

After nine years of military and quasi-military rule, which included a contrived and rigged election in 2002, Pakistanis finally went to the polls on 18 February 2008. Notwithstanding fear of terrorist attacks at the election booths, over 46 percent of eligible voters cast their vote. The environment was most explosive: manifest rigging would have set in motion mass protests. The large number of foreign observers and Pakistani volunteers who monitored the election agreed that the elections were, by and large, free and fair. The people voted clearly for change.