How Many Votes a Party Needs to Win Pak Elections?

Muhammad Ashraf
Nov 7, 2006

The answer is just 10 million. Surprised? Read on.

2002

Following are the results of 2002 National Assembly (NA) :

1) PPPP candidates secured 7.4 million votes (25.4%), more than any other party.
2) PML (Q) followed closely with 6.9 million votes (23.8%).
3) PML (N) and MMA got 3.3 million (11.4%) and 3.2 million (11.0%) votes, respectively, about one-half of those of each of PPPP and PML (Q).
4) MQM got less than one million votes (3.2%).
5) Average number of votes cast (for both winners & losers) per seat was 106,346.
6) Of the major parties, in terms of votes polled per seat won, PML (Q), MMA, and MQM were the most successful, obtaining one seat per 74,985, 70,700, and 70,799 votes polled, respectively. PPPP with average votes of 116,848 per seat won did relatively poor. PML (N) fared the worst with 235,190 votes per seat won.
7) Assuming average required votes per seat of 75,000 (over 70% of the average votes cast per seat), total votes required to win a majority (137 seats) would be 10.275 million.


Now a look at the number of votes cast in the two referendums of 1984 and 2002:

More votes were cast in referendums than in for National Assembly, even though there was only one candidate in the referendums, and thousands in the NA with generally fierce competition among the contestants.

1) In the 1984 referendum, 21.3 million votes were cast for Zia ul Haq, 22% more than the total number of votes cast for all candidates (winners & losers) in the 1985 NA .
2) In the 2002 referendum, 42.8 million votes were cast for (PM), 48% more than the total number of votes cast for all candidates in the 2002 NA and twice as much as for Zia.
Also, please note that votes cast in favor of PM in 2002 were:
3) About six times as many as those polled by all candidates (winners & losers) of each of PPPP and PML (Q), the two largest parties, in the 2002 NA .
4) More than four times that required to win a majority in the NA (4 x 10.275 = 41.1).


And now a puzzle:

If PM got 42.8 million votes in the 2002 referendum and he just needs about one-fourth of that figure to have a majority in the NA, and by the same logic, only one-third as many to win a two-thirds majority in the NA, then why does he need to rely on his post to keep his presidency secure?