Last year, shortly after returning to Pakistan from a four-year self-exile in the United Kingdom, thrice-elected former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif chose Hafizabad, a city in central Punjab, to launch his election campaign for the 2024 election.
The decision appears to have been purposeful.
The ultimate election battleground for Sharif’s political party, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN), was Punjab, Pakistan’s most populated province. Its home turf was central Punjab, which stretched along both sides of the old Grand Trunk Road.
Here was a voter the PML-N knew and could rely on. However, the results in 2024 indicated that something had fundamentally changed.
Several party leaders, including Rana Sanaullah, Khurram Dastgir, Saira Afzal Tarar, Khawaja Saad Rafique, and Abid Sher Ali, were defeated in central Punjab by its opponent, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), led by imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan.
This time, in central Punjab’s Gujranwala district, the PML-N was only able to get two out of five national assembly constituencies and six out of 12 in the provincial legislature.
Six years ago, in the 2018 elections, despite Sharif’s imprisonment on alleged fraud charges and a state crackdown on his party, his party stormed across most of central Punjab.
In the Gujranwala district, for example, it won all five national assembly seats and 14 provincial constituencies.
In fact, Khan’s PTI won first position in Pakistan’s national elections on February 8, despite the fact that Sharif’s party was widely regarded as the frontrunner. Despite a harsh crackdown, the PTI secured the most seats in the National Assembly.
Despite a significant gain, the PTI’s 91 parliamentary seats in the centre and 108 seats in Punjab province were unable to create a majority administration in the National and Punjab Assembly.
The PTI claims systemic electoral fraud and that it was denied a simple majority.
