44 political parties are vying for seats as Pakistan prepares for elections. This is a list of the main participants

44 political parties are vying for seats as Pakistan prepares for elections. This is a list of the main participants

On Thursday, Pakistan will conduct parliamentary elections in which 44 political parties will run for seats. Important figures include Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, Imran Khan, Nawaz Sharif, Shehbaz Sharif, and strongman General Asim Munir.

Pakistan will hold its parliamentary elections on Thursday. The National Assembly, the lower house of parliament, has 266 members, with an extra 70 seats set aside for women and minorities. At least 44 political parties are vying for these seats.

Prior to the Pakistani elections, these are the main participants

1) Pakistan Muslim League, Nawaz Sharif: Nawaz Sharif, a business magnate, multimillionaire, and three-term prime minister, is a member of two prominent families that have controlled Pakistani politics for many years. In 2007 and 2013, his Pakistan Muslim League party achieved enormous victory.

However, the AP noted that Sharif, 74, never served out a full term in government and was removed from office three times—once by the army, once by the Supreme Court, and once by the president.

Similar to previous past prime ministers of Pakistan, Sharif has faced court battles and jail terms. A Pakistani court issued an arrest order in 2020 and threatened to proclaim him wanted from Pakistan if he did not come back from his self-imposed exile in the UK to face allegations related to corruption. He is very popular and attracts thousands of fans to party rallies despite years of controversy.

Courts reversed his conviction and jail sentence when he returned to the nation in October of last year, providing him with a clear road to a fourth term, according to the AP.

The scenario seems to be set for a reversal of events from the 2018 election, when Sharif was facing court proceedings and Khan became prime minister. Imran Khan, his arch opponent, is now imprisoned. Now that Khan is in jail, experts believe Sharif will win again.

2) Strong army head General Asim Munir: Although often operating behind the scenes, Pakistan's military has always asserted itself as the ultimate judge in significant political choices. General Asim Munir, the current army leader and a former spy who is obsessed with fitness, is not running for office but still has a lot of power in his position.

Compared to his predecessors, Munir has maintained a quieter profile, but the AP said that he has intensified military tribunals for civilians and launched a crackdown on foreign people who are unlawfully residing in the nation.

The measure primarily targets the 1.7 million Afghans who reside in Pakistan and has been denounced by both local and international rights organizations. The roughly fifty-year-old Munir was also responsible for a string of tit-for-tat retaliatory airstrikes inside Iran earlier this month, which precipitously increased tensions between Islamabad and Tehran.

3) Imran Khan, the leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Party: An Islamist politician who was a former cricket player, Imran Khan won the 2018 election on a platform of opposing corruption and the establishment in order to build a coalition government. However, his tenure as prime minister was troubled by the way his government repressed opposition leaders.

Some claimed that his calumny against ultraconservative clergy sparked assaults on religious minorities; the AP said that his detractors and civil rights organizations alleged he did not uphold the right to free speech.

After blaming an increase in sexual attacks on "scantily clad" women, Khan, 71, faced widespread criticism. On the international scene, he referred to Al-Qaeda commander and said that the US was unappreciative of Pakistan's assistance in combating international terrorism. A "martyr" is a phrase used to commemorate those who have died in war, and Osama bin Laden was one of them. He was killed in a US attack in Pakistan in 2011.

Khan attempted to quell public demonstrations he believed were being planned by Washington and his opponents, but in the end, he was removed by parliament in April 2022. He has been imprisoned since August on four charges of corruption, disclosing state secrets, and violating marital regulations, and he now faces more than 150 legal proceedings against him.

4) Shehbaz Sharif, Pakistan Muslim League: In April 2022, Shehbaz Sharif, 72, the younger brother of Nawaz Sharif, will take over as prime minister from Imran Khan. Prior to this, he served as Punjab's (the biggest and most powerful province's) third chief minister. Additionally, half of the 240 million people living in the nation call it home. While living in self-exile in London, he headed his brother's party. After Khan was removed from office by a vote of no confidence in Parliament, he was named prime minister.

In the summer of 2022, during Sharif's presidency, Pakistan was struck by an enormous amount of rainfall and flash floods that killed 1,700 people and completely destroyed the nation, at one point submerging a third of it. Still, he waited until late August, when the death toll was in the hundreds, to proclaim a national emergency.

He also found it difficult to handle Pakistan's greatest economic crisis to date.India agreed to a significant increase in electricity costs in exchange for an IMF bailout, which resulted in a surge in the cost of basic goods. As a result, he and the party lost support.

When Parliament was dissolved in August of last year, Sharif was required by the Pakistani constitution to stand down. The acting prime minister then took control until elections were conducted. Sharif is probably going to be a major player in his brother's cabinet if his party wins on Thursday.

The youngest contender for the position of prime minister in Pakistan is Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari of the Pakistan Peoples Movement. He is the son of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto as well as the son of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the nation's first democratically elected prime minister. Grandson, the nation's leader in the 1970s until the military toppled him and had him executed.

Party members continue to hold Bhutto-Zardari's mother and grandpa in high regard, which makes them relevant to the public. A few days after his mother was killed in 2007 while running for prime minister a third time, he was elected head of the political party that belonged to his family. Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto-Zardari's father, influenced her political career as well. He presided over Pakistan as president from 2008 to 2013, but his role was mostly ceremonial.

After Imran Khan resigned as prime minister in 2018, he was elected to his first term in parliament and appointed foreign minister. The agricultural and economic centre of southern Sindh province is Bhutto's stronghold, but the AP notes that her party is unlikely to garner enough support to elevate her to the position of prime minister.

It may still be a component of the coalition government headed by Sharif. The 35-year-old Bhutto-Zardari has pledged to put an end to the personal grudges that define Pakistani politics and has called for investment in climate resilience as essential to the nation's future.