Voting finishes in crucial Pakistan election

RTÉ News brings you complete coverage of Pakistan's historic - and dangerous - election. Brian O'Connell is on the ground. Watch and listen to his reports below.

Pakistanis have voted today in elections that are expected to further destabilise the country and determine the future of President Pervez Musharraf, a key ally in the US-led 'war on terror.'

The parliamentary poll has been brutally overshadowed by the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto in December, and dogged by widespread allegations of rigging in favour of Mr Musharraf's allies.

Mr Musharraf, who sacked the judiciary to pave his way to a second presidential term last year, is not contesting the polls, but he faces impeachment if the opposition wins more than two-thirds of parliament.

Ms Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party has meanwhile threatened to unleash street protests if it feels robbed of victory, a move that would plunge the country further into crisis, with potentially global repercussions.

Pakistan has already being hit by a wave of suicide bombings, including the one that killed Ms Bhutto at an election rally on December and forced the postponement of the vote from its original date on 8 January.

Tens of thousands of troops fanned out across Pakistan this week to guard government installations and some 64,000 polling stations, nearly a third of which have been declared sensitive by the government.

The violence has knocked the wind out of Pakistan's normally colourful electoral campaigns and led to disenchantment amongst Pakistan’s 80 million registered voters, which is about half the population.

The instability has also increased concerns in Washington and other Western capitals about Mr Musharraf's ability to tackle the spread of al-Qaeda and Taliban militants from Pakistan's tribal areas on the Afghan border.

The 64-year-old former general, who seized power in a military coup in 1999, has meanwhile seen his popularity nosedive in a series of recent opinion polls carried out by foreign organisations.

Mr Musharraf has vowed that the polls would be free, fair, transparent and peaceful, while also rejecting the accusations of rigging.

But he also issued a stern warning that he would not tolerate any opposition protests if they do not accept the results.

Mr Musharraf, who has received $10bn in US aid since abandoning Pakistan's support for the Afghan Taliban regime in 2001, also told his backers that they should not abandon him.

'This region is critical for the world,' he said in a televised address.

Pakistani politics is notoriously decided by clan and family loyalties at a local level.

But Mr Musharraf's political fate is likely to depend ultimately on Ms Bhutto's widower, Asif Ali Zardari, and Nawaz Sharif, the man the president ousted.

Mr Zardari said week that he would 'decide how to take the people to the streets, how to do political agitation enough to get our point of view across' should there be evidence of fraud.

But while Mr Sharif has refused outright to work with Musharraf after elections, Mr Zardari has been more circumspect, saying that he would form a 'unity government' if he won the polls.

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