None of the previous Senate elections generated so much heat as the one being held on March 4 is likely to do. Not because it would put the fate of the present ruling coalition on line, it is so because it would determine the fate of the Seventeenth Amendment, on which largely rests the present power structure.
More pointedly, it would have direct bearing on the power and authority enjoyed by Asif Ali Zardari, as the president. In the outgoing Senate the ruling coalition does not have the majority, but it is its hope that it would not only gain simple majority in the upper house but also possibly a two-thirds majority which would arm it with power to amend the Constitution. But as they say there's many a slip 'betwixt the cup and the lip'. Who votes for whom and why - theories abound as to the motivation that drives a voter's decision, but among these the most popular asserts that money plays a decisive role.
Under the Constitution, the four provincial assemblies would elect senators in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote. This is, of course, a complex process but it is decidedly more democratic as it greatly frees the voting MPAs from their party dictates. But then it also opens the doors for corruption. A voter may very well commit his first preference for his/her party candidate but 'contract out' his second or third preferences.
It is just possible that there may be a candidate in the field who accumulates more second or third preferences than the one carries the party nomination and gets a few first preferences. The present state of national politics tends to be quite conducive to buy-and-sell voting in the provincial assemblies of Balochistan and NWFP and FATA. But in the Punjab Assembly, given its presently pivotal position in the on-going tussle between the two main contenders to the country's leadership the market forces may be relegated to the dictates of party-loyalty.
Interestingly, the Senate election will be held only a few days ahead of the 'long march-cum-dharna' announced by the lawyers' community. The ruling coalition may or may not win a two-thirds majority in the Senate but there is no reason why it would not gain the majority position. That would definitely help strengthen the confidence of the government in meeting the lawyers' challenge. But there is also the risky though remote possibility that the N and Q factions of the Muslim League decide to field joint candidates. There is also the risk that the JUI (F) may develop a mismatch of perceptions with the PPP over Senate election in the NWFP assembly and thus cause fissures in the coalition at the Centre.
Though uncertainties abound the final shape of things to emerge from the March 4 Senate election, the very fact of election being held bolsters the morale of democratic forces in the country. Since as the Upper House, the Senate of Pakistan functions as saucer to bring down the temperatures of tea poured from the cup that is the National Assembly the people look forward to more mature and independent-minded politicians being nominated and elected.
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