Bilawal manages to win only one of three seats
Pakistan’s 2018 election was full of shockers but the biggest surprise was the defeat of young Bilawal Bhutto Zardari from Lyari, a longtime stronghold of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).
Bilawal finished third in NA246, a Karachi constituency his party has been winning since the 1970s.
The chairman of the oldest dynastic party and son of slain leader Benazir Bhutto, Bilawal, who was contesting from three National Assembly (NA) seats, managed to win only one from the PPP’s fort of Larkana as he also lost to the PTI in Malakand.
According to the results released by the Election Commission of Pakistan, Bilawal, whose family has a longtime association with Lyari area, could only get 39,325 votes against the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Shakoor Shad who won the seat by bagging 52,750 votes. What’s more surprising is that Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan’s Ahmed Baksh received more votes than Bilawal and stole the second spot from him.
The young Bhutto could only manage to get to third place in the electoral race, making it one of the most embarrassing defeats for the party in an area that has voted exclusively for the PPP. The PPP also lost two provincial assembly seats of Lyari — PS-107 and PS-108.
Analyst Mazhar Abbas termed the defeat in Lyari as “PPP’s biggest setback since 1970.” Political analysts connect this defeat of PPP with the deprived state of affairs in Lyari.