My final entry about the elections in Azad Kashmir. The Muslim Conference party has emerged as the largest party and with some minor horse trading, will be able to form a government quite comfortably. This is hardly surprising, when a conspiracy to break up the People’s Party was cooked up by the real power, which is Pakistan. They succeeded, and the pro-Pakistani establishment party will continue to ‘rule’.
The election has also decoupled merit and ability from politics (if there ever was a link). What is clear is that the first requirement is money, loads of it, to be able to buy off possible opponents and holders of vote banks. There, voting is hardly an individual act. Extended families vote the same people. The more united a wider ‘biradri’ is, the more worth it is to grease the palms of their leading members. I am not saying that meritocracy is perfect- indeed it can be quite exclusive, creating a meritocratic elite. . However it is a worthier standard compared to money and the ability to bribe.
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