Pakistanis went to the polls on May 11^th to participate in landmark national and provincial elections. Violent attacks by the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) insurgency disproportionately targeted vocal opponents of the TTP prior to the vote, and clashes between rival candidates continued on election day itself. But despite the threats and disputed results in some constituencies - particularly the country's largest city of Karachi - this appears to have been the freest and fairest election in Pakistan since the country's first democratic national election in 1970. Its legitimacy was enhanced by being one of the most widely contested elections in Pakistan's history, with all major national and regional political parties taking part in what appears to have been a genuinely competitive contest.

During the campaign period, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) chairman Imran Khan in particular seized media headlines and public attention with calls for change and efforts to mobilize the country's large youth vote. But given the PTI's disappointing electoral performance relative to expectations, credit for the high levels of participation - currently projected by the Election Commission at around 60% nationwide, considerably more than the 44% reported in 2008 - must also be shared more broadly. Beyond the party campaigns, a diverse and vibrant array of media coverage and social media participation, a caretaker government and Election Commission administration of the polls that were broadly accepted as neutral, and public commitments by the military establishment not to intervene all appear to have contributed to voters' determination to take part in the elections - despite Taliban threats and calls for a boycott.

Table 1: Preliminary Pakistan National Assembly 2013 Election Results

Source: Election Commission of Pakistan, Party Position (National Assembly), as of Wednesday, May 15, available at http://www.ecp.gov.pk/overallpartyposition05152013412.pdf

Note: Results are for 272 directly contested national assembly seats, and do not include 60 seats for women and 10 for minorities that are allocated proportionally to parties based on election performance. Candidates are allowed to contest multiple seats, requiring special elections in the event that they win in more than one constituency, meaning final results will be subject to further change.

Although the final results have yet to be certified, Table 1 illustrates that the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) led by former two-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif, has emerged as the clear victor. The party was able to nearly double the number of National Assembly seats it won from 68 in 2008 to at least 124 in 2013. Most pre-poll analysis predicted that the PML-N would emerge as the single largest party, but the general expectation was that the elections would produce a hung parliament requiring Nawaz Sharif to cobble together a weak coalition government. The PML-N's decisive victory, however, will enable it to reach out to potential coalition partners from a position of strength, increasing its freedom of action to use its newfound political capital. Whether this tremendous advantage will be seized or squandered remains to be seen, but expectations are already being raised - possibly unrealistically so - that Nawaz Sharif will now be in a position to tackle a range of issues from Pakistan's acute energy shortages to helping normalize relations with India.

While Imran Khan's PTI supporters may be the most disappointed voters after coming in second place across most of Punjab, the biggest loser in 2013 was the Pakistan Peoples' Party (PPP), which had led Pakistan's coalition government from 2008-2013. Whereas the PML-N nearly doubled its seat numbers, the PPP was reduced from 89 seats in 2008 to 31 in 2013. While the scale of the PPP's defeat surprised many, the fact that it lost seats reflects a consistent feature in Pakistani electoral politics, which is the disadvantage of incumbency. No political party has won back-to-back elections in Pakistan since the PPP's victory in 1977 in an election widely acknowledged to have been massively rigged. The shortage of resources available to meet patronage demands often leaves the majority of voters unhappy with incumbents, who are then punished the next time elections are held.

This tendency was further exacerbated by the deep discontent of most voters with the direction in which Pakistan was heading (91% according to a recent Pew poll), and the perception that the PPP-led government from 2008-2013 was corrupt and inefficient, doing little to tackle some of the major issues confronting Pakistan, such as the country's serious energy crisis. The most disturbing aspect of the PPP's dismal performance is that it has now essentially been reduced to a party of rural Sindh, whereas historically it has been the only national party able to consistently win seats in all four provinces. It remains to be seen whether this devastating defeat, especially in the largest province of Punjab where it won only one seat, will serve as a wake-up call and force a substantial shakeup within the party, or whether it will continue its downward spiral into yet another ethnically defined party.

Another impact of the 2013 election result is that the role of the Pakistani presidency is likely to diminish further after the PML-N assumes office. Although the 18^th Amendment to Pakistan's constitution in April 2010 formally transferred many powers of office that had accrued to the president under General Pervez Musharraf's tenure to the prime minister, President Asif Ali Zardari's leadership of the PPP allowed him to retain effective control over its activities in parliament - though a verdict from the Lahore High Court forced him to relinquish his party title prior to the start of the campaign season. Zardari's term in office expires later this fall, and he now appears unlikely to secure reelection by the electoral college comprised of the national and provincial assemblies and the upper senate house. For the first time since Nawaz Sharif's ouster in a 1999 military coup, civilian power in the Pakistani political system will be re-centering in the office of the prime minister rather than a powerful president.

This represents a shift from the past five years, which had seen a general diffusion of power within the country. The PPP tenure was marked by significant compromises on power-sharing with the opposition and between the central and provincial governments. But the difficulties of managing a fractious coalition and fending off challenges to the government's authority from the judiciary and Pakistan's powerful security services ultimately consumed much of the PPP leadership's attentions. The result was a slow consensus-based policymaking process that, while necessarily more inclusive of the interests of the country's diverse centers of powers, stalled out before resolving many of the critical concerns facing Pakistan - particularly on economic reforms needed to address chronic energy shortages, fiscal deficits and tax revenue collection shortfalls, and Pakistan's integration through trade with its neighbors.

Table 1: Preliminary Pakistan Provincial Assembly 2013 Election Results

Source: Election Commission of Pakistan, Party Position (Provincial Assemblies), as of Wednesday, May 15, available at http://www.ecp.gov.pk/overallpartypositionPA05152013412.pdf

Although the largest parties managed to achieve small footholds in the other provinces, the overall election result has reinforced the regionalization and localization of political party organizations in Pakistan. Despite its wins, the PML-N made few gains outside of Punjab itself. The PPP retained its hold over the Sindh assembly, but lost its position elsewhere in the country. Although it failed to make major hoped-for gains in Punjab, the PTI secured approximately a third of the seats in the Khyber-Paktunkhwa provincial assembly, echoing the decisive ouster in 2008 of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal coalition of religious parties by the Awami National Party, which has now itself failed to gain reelection to any more than a handful of provincial assembly seats. Balochistan, which faces an active separatist insurgency and saw the lowest levels of participation, experienced the most fragmented electoral outcomes, with ethnic nationalist parties, religious parties, and independents dividing the provincial assembly and delegation to parliament.

The PPP retains a plurality in the upper senate house, and administrative devolution processes mandated by the 18^th and 19^th amendments to the Pakistani constitution have strengthened the autonomy and responsibilities of provincial governments, as well as locking in larger shares of national tax revenues for the provinces. The PML-N supported many of these reforms during its time in opposition, benefiting through its management of the Punjab government. It is possible the PPP and PTI opposition parties' control over provincial governments will ensure their stake in the system and provide for a negotiated balance of power with the PML-N at the center. But given the history of conflict in Pakistan over issues of federalism and provincial autonomy, relations between the new Punjab-based government in the center and the rest of the country have the potential to be a significant source of political tension going forward.

Beyond questions of divided center-provincial relations, the new PML-N government must also balance its relations with Pakistan's unelected centers of power - namely the military and the increasingly assertive judiciary. Speculation is already mounting as to whether Nawaz Sharif, who when previously in office confronted and was overthrown in a military coup by General Musharraf, will again try to increase the role of civilian authorities in security and foreign policymaking - traditionally the domain of Pakistan's military. Both the military and the judiciary are facing transitions of their own later this year, as Chief of Army Staff General Ashaq Kayani and Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry approach the end of their respective terms. These two institutions have effectively self-selecting control over their membership and leadership appointments, and are likely to continue to check parliament's freedom of action, potentially setting up deeper institutional clashes if a Sharif government chooses a course of more direct confrontation than its predecessor.

The new PML-N government takes office with many major challenges to resolve, including the ailing economy, tense relations with its neighbors to the east and west, and the continuing threat of domestic militancy. The PML-N, which played a patient waiting game in opposition throughout the PPP's tenure, can now credibly claim a mandate for action on many of these issues. But even with a stronger base of support in its home province of Punjab and in the national parliament, it will still face limits to its ability to push through new policies. Nonetheless, the transition from the PPP-led government at the end of its full term in office to a popularly elected successor is an important institutionalization of the democratic process as a means of resolving political disputes, and a hopeful sign for Pakistan's future political stability.

Andrew Wilder is the Director of Afghanistan and Pakistan Programs at the United States Institute of Peace, where Colin Cookman is a researcher. The views reflected here are their own.

As of this year, Afghanistan has experienced ten years of stabilization intervention, but what is there to show for it? Marked by massive expenditure with little to no accountability, and often marred by waste, stabilization in Afghanistan started out with arguably honorable aims. However, as troops prepare to leave in 2014, what legacy will be left behind?

Provincial Reconstruction Teams (PRTs) began with perhaps the best of intentions: to fill the vacuum of law and order left by the fall of the Taliban and undertake reconstruction, badly needed in a country devastated by three decades of conflict. The security situation was perceived to be relatively benign, with the major threats being criminals and warlords seeking to reassert power.

PRTs did some positive work, often acting as the only authority in a security vacuum, and were appreciated, at least early on, by Afghans. They were no substitute, however, for the effective governance and security required. PRTs' predominantly military staff received little to no training, lacked the technical skills required to carry out development work and focused more on short term quick impact projects instead of the long term state-and-peace-building work that was so badly needed.  Rather than seeking to build Afghan capacity - a central component of their mandate - they often worked around the government. The PRTs also created winners and losers, supporting local strongmen or funneling money through often corrupt construction companies.  

Despite early U.S. government acknowledgement of these problems, PRTs expanded rapidly, led by a multitude of different nations that were often unable to effectively coordinate amongst each another.  In 2008, the US Congress described the situation as one with "no clear definition of the PRT mission, no concept of operations or doctrine, no standard operating procedures."

As insecurity spread, the dual security and reconstruction roles of PRTs became increasingly schizophrenic. One incident in Ghazni province in 2004 saw PRT officials offering to build a well for villagers just weeks after they had fired rockets into the very same village killing nine children.  Unsurprisingly, residents were hardly consoled and Afghan goodwill for the PRTs was quickly eroded.

But the amount of money available for military-led development continued to increase.  In 2009, the US Army published the Commanders' Guide to Money as a Weapons System, which defined aid as "a nonlethal weapon" to be utilised to "win the hearts and minds of the indigenous population to facilitate defeating the insurgents." Aid devoted to these objectives rapidly increased: annual funding for the Commander's Emergency Response Program (CERP), the primary U.S. PRT funding stream, rose from $200m in 2007 to $1bn in 2010.

No centralised, comprehensive records appear to have been kept on the PRTs, either within the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) or the Afghan government, and rarely even within PRTs. When auditors found CERP project files incomplete or non-existent in 2009, CERP project managers told US auditors that their focus "was on obligating funds for projects rather than monitoring their implementation." Unsurprisingly there has been no comprehensive monitoring and evaluation of CERP-funded programmes; the most thorough examination is a 2011 SIGAR audit of CERP programming in the insecure eastern province of Laghman. It's a harrowing read.  Of the $53m CERP funds allocated to the PRT between 2008 and 2011, 92% (or $49.2m) was dedicated to projects found by SIGAR to be "at risk or have questionable outcomes." Funds were not managed in accordance with standard operating procedures, which were finally established in 2009, and none of the 69 projects had sufficient documentation to track outcomes. Again and again, the audit found the Afghan government unable to take over PRT projects.

PRTs were not the only instrument of stabilization. Between 2003 and 2012, USAID obligated $1.1bn in stabilization funding to for-profit contractors but such projects fared no better. One example is USAID's ‘flagship counterinsurgency program' the Local Government and Community Development Programme (LGCD). The budget and timelines for the $400m, five-year project mushroomed despite questionable early evaluation findings and the fact that over half of LGCD's expenditures were on staff costs and security.  USAID officials were unable to visit several sites because it was too dangerous. As for its impact, the USAID Inspector-General reported ‘the project's overall success seemed highly questionable.'

Part of the problem is that the goals of stabilization in Afghanistan were never comprehensively, consistently or clearly articulated.  Stabilization works on the assumption that conflicts are fuelled by grievances about poverty or neglect, and that development projects that improve governance, opportunities and services can ‘stabilize' conflict situations. But evidence is lacking or discouraging.  A 2011 Tufts university study found while there was some evidence some stabilization interventions can work in the short term, there is little evidence of long term security gains and much more indicating a tendency to create local conflict and ‘perverse incentives' to maintain insecurity.

In an world where aid agencies are required to prove their ‘value for money' and aid-receiving governments are pressured to become fully transparent, the lack of systematic, government-led push for accountability for the multi-billion dollar investments is hypocritical and irresponsible - and speaks to an ideological unwillingness to address the problems and pitfalls of stabilization approaches.

The lack of interest in documenting the impact of the stabilization efforts - both what works and what doesn't - does not bode well for the rest of the world. As global focus turns to other complex emergencies in Mali, Yemen and Somalia, stabilization is increasingly the approach of choice. Without recognizing systematic problems, stabilization interventions are unlikely to improve and begin to fulfill their lofty goals. After the troop drawdown in Afghanistan next year, perhaps we'll have a better idea of the true legacy of stabilization. But for now, the future looks worryingly unstable.

Ashley Jackson is a Research Fellow in the Humanitarian Policy Group at the Overseas Development Institute. Before joining ODI she worked for several years in Afghanistan with the United Nations and Oxfam.

Afghanistan stands at a crossroads. The reputation of our political leadership is under suspicion. Tens of millions of dollars are said to have been received illegally from intelligence agencies of both friends and foes. People are losing faith in the state and the prospects of democracy. The year 2014 looms large in everyone's mind, as does the Taliban's possible reemergence as a real power.

With the April 2014 presidential elections approaching, people around the world are wondering where exactly Afghanistan is headed. Has the threat of al-Qaeda really been eradicated as President Barack Obama recently announced? Is the war in Afghanistan really over? If so, is it over for Afghans, or just the international community?

Few of the promised counterterrorism and state building efforts have been delivered. In all 34 provinces of Afghanistan there are still acts of war and terrorism being committed - in some places incidents occur daily, in others weekly or monthly. Even our highway system has yet to be secured. No one is free to travel anywhere without at least some fear they will encounter the Taliban. Afghans live in fear of everything from targeted killings to suicide attacks and other forms terrorism. Our sisters and daughters have to live in fear that they will be attacked while doing something as mundane and Islamic as attending school.

Meanwhile, our politics are a mess. Our relationship with the United States and their NATO allies has deteriorated to the point where President Hamid Karzai himself is now referring to Afghanistan as a graveyard of empires, and accusing the United States and its allies of supporting rather than routing the Taliban in order to destabilize Afghanistan. 

At the same time, Washington and its friends are leaking controversial details about how exactly they have been propping up President Karzai. Yes, the U.S. is now saying, the CIA is funding in unaccounted-for cash payments Karzai's inner circle.

Aside from the non-existent national security and troubled foreign policy, Afghanistan is also facing the possibility of an economic meltdown. Imagine what will happen to our aid-dependent and U.S.-contract-centric economy when the United States withdraws not just the bulk of its troops but its funds as well.

How is Afghanistan going to transition from an economy that has received hundreds of billions of dollars over the past decade-plus of war?  What are the tens of thousands of Afghan companies that have come up as a result of this level of funding going to do then? Not to mention the Afghans who work for the many-times-more international companies, or the 3,000 NGOs that have sprung up during this international campaign that is about to end. If we think today's Afghanistan has an unsustainably high rate of unemployment, what will tomorrow's Afghanistan look like when all this funding ceases?

In a country with thirteen million jobless, most of whom are under twenty-five years old, and a raging insurgency with its own foreign sources of funds, training camps, intelligence and strategic support base, it's hard to imagine a stable and peaceful Afghanistan.

To survive as a nation-state resembling anything like the state we envisioned in Bonn in 2001, we have two main solutions.

First, we need to have a stable transfer of power in the form of the 2014 presidential elections. If our political system is too fragile to deliver even that bare minimum, we have much to fear from the still-raging insurgency. And we cannot have a stable transfer of power if all we do is reinstate President Karzai. Presidents for life are not the beacons of the democracy we envisioned in 2001.

In terms of domestic politics and foreign policy we need very specific programs. We need a government that delivers services. We need to change our traditional culture of a master-slave governance model in which civil servants and government officers rule over our people who they see as slaves.

In our foreign policy, we need to build friendships, not just sustain enemies or provide a battlefield for outside conflicts. The global order is transforming into a multi-polar one, we need to build on our already budding friendship with important regional players in the region such as India and we need to salvage what we can from our relationship with the United States, both of which are becoming our strategic allies.

To address our security dilemmas and challenges, we need a combination of solutions framed as a grand strategy rather than only tactical military or reconciliation ones. With the reconciliation strategy the only one being considered as a means to dealing with the insurgents, the Afghan government and the international community are using a risky black and white model. Instead we need to see reconciliation as a sub-tool in a broader political strategy for the stabilization of Afghanistan. We need to recognize that insurgencies take time and need strategic patience to combat -- every insurgency, from those fought in El Salvador to Central Asia, has taught us that.  We need to oppose the Taliban not just militarily but by building public confidence through service delivery and good governance; the strengthening and effective functioning of our security establishment; support to our economic sectors; and the reconciliation and reintegration efforts already begun by NATO's counterinsurgency strategy.

And finally, we need to build our economy. We need to follow models of leadership such as General Park's of South Korea, or South Africa after apartheid. And to begin this process the first thing we need to do is get rid of politicians who see their office as the best job Afghanistan has to offer.

2013 is the year that Afghans will make a decision. Either we put ourselves on the path to a prosperous and ideal Afghanistan or we will be back on the path of war and isolation, a country sourced for strategic threats to international security.

Mohammad Arif Rahmani is a member of Central Audit and Rule of Law Committee of Lower House of Afghanistan's parliament.

Pakistan's upcoming elections on May 11 provoke both fear and hope. The last time Pakistan held a reasonably free and fair election, in 1970, the country ended up splitting into two, as Bangladesh emerged out of the ruins of a horrible civil war that led to Indian military intervention. This time, the election has been marked by a violent campaign by the Tehreek-e-Taliban of Pakistan against selected political parties, even while a raging insurgency in the border region with Afghanistan is keeping some 140,000 troops of the Pakistan army fully occupied in a holding pattern. A nationalist insurgency and sectarian and ethnic battles in Baluchistan have raised fears of another "Bangladesh" in the making, though these may be exaggerated.  Absent a robust civilian administration, the prospects of the military's counter insurgency moving beyond the "hold" phase to "build and transfer" are dim. Meanwhile, the United States needs a stable Pakistan, among other things, to allow the Coalition to exit Afghanistan in an orderly manner and to prevent the economic and political implosion of nuclear-armed Pakistan: something that keeps leaders in the region and around the globe on edge. Behind these complex issues, there is much to discover: both positive and negative.

These elections in Pakistan represent the clash of expectations and realities. While many are calling this a watershed moment in the country's benighted history, the elections are not likely to create any immediate seismic shifts in the political landscape. The powers of incumbency weigh heavily in favor of the mainstream parties at the constituency level, where tribal loyalties play a huge role in voting behavior.  It is possible some major parties will team up to throw back the challenge of upstarts like the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI ) of Imran Khan. The injury that took him out of active campaigning in the final days of the campaign may garner him some sympathy surge of support, making his challenge to the status quo even more powerful. Overthrowing a well-entrenched system of political spoils that has created a rentier state in Pakistan may be impossible in short order. Politicians, civil administrators, and even the elements in the military have become used to a Culture of Entitlement that provides heavily subsidized state-owned land and other perquisites to the chosen few, creating palpable disaffection among the general public.

Khan's PTI may surprise the political system if enough youth and new voters actually come out to vote. So voter and youth turnout will be important. He has created a couple of changes that will have far-reaching effects on Pakistan's politics. He has awakened the youth vote. Some 34 per cent of the registered voters today are below 30. He also held intra-party elections, a foreign concept for the autocratic "selection" system of appointing party officials among most of the dynastic main stream parties for whom politics is family business. Only the Jamaat-i-Islami routinely holds internal elections.  If these moves take root they could change the political landscape over time.

The legacy of the civilian administration of the Pakistan People's Party is a mixed one. By devolving political and economic power from the Center to the provinces, it did the right thing but implemented it in a hasty manner. As a result, confusion reigns on the economic and political front on the funding and implementation of projects in the provinces. But this shift of power to the provinces will give greater heft to the results of the provincial elections, because that is where future economic decisions will be made and development projects implemented. Also, the provincial legislators will be a key part of the Electoral College for the election of the next President of Pakistan later this year.

Conventional wisdom borne out by numerous recent polls  in Pakistan appears to favor a return to power of the former Prime Minister Mian Mohammed Nawaz Sharif though there are still many unknowns, among them the almost 40 million new voters on the rolls, most of whom are disaffected youth who, according to a new British Council poll, fear the worst for their country and have little confidence in their political leaders. Sharif's base is the Punjab, an economic and political powerhouse. If he wins, this will be the first time in a long while when the Center and the Punjab are in the same hands, promising potential economic stability and growth that could lift the entire economy out of the hole that the PPP government dug. Sharif also promises to open the border with India to trade and traffic, allowing the deep-seated hostility between these old rivals to become muted and both to prosper economically. An India-Pakistan détente would augur well for Afghanistan too, supporting transit trade and links to Central Asia via Afghanistan. But that is a long-term prospect.

For now, Pakistan would do well to survive the elections on May 11 without creating further fissures in its polity and without raising the specter of military intervention, something that appears remote at present but is seen as a default option by some Pakistanis. The best the military can do, as promised by army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, is to provide a secure environment for the elections with 70,000 troops deployed on Election Day. Then back to the barracks, hopefully. They still have an internal war to fight, against their homegrown insurgents and terrorists. And the new government will have its hands full fixing a broken economy.

Shuja Nawaz is director of the South Asia Center of the Atlantic Council in Washington DC

Event notice: Auditing Afghanistan, a conversation with the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction. TODAY, 12:15-1:45PM (NAF).

Unabated

Militant attacks continued in Pakistan on Wednesday, when a suicide bomber rammed his explosives-laden vehicle into the barrier protecting a police station in the Bannu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, killing three and wounding 23 others (AFP, Dawn). Later, one person was killed and over a dozen wounded in a blast at a central market in the neighboring district of Hangu (ET, Dawn). Neither bombing appeared to be election-related violence, which has claimed over 100 lives in the past month, according to a Washington Post tally (Post, LAT).

The Taliban is not the only Pakistani militant group staging attacks on political candidates and their supporters this election season; separatists in the southwestern province of Balochistan have targeted fellow Baloch candidates and their supporters, who are seen by the separatists as betraying the cause by agreeing to participate in the upcoming elections (AP). At least six people have been killed and some 40 wounded in attacks targeting candidates in Balochistan.

Pakistani prime minister hopeful Imran Khan fell off of a forklift platform as he was being raised up to a stage on Tuesday, suffering two hairline skull fractures and a fractured backbone (NYT, AP, AFP). From his hospital bed, he made a rousing speech that asked whether Pakistanis want "a new Pakistan," and he pledged to "change the destiny of our children."

Meanwhile, the candidate who is expected to win Saturday's election, Nawaz Sharif of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), pledged to improve his country's ties with India if he is elected (Reuters). "If I become the prime minister I will make sure that the Pakistani soil is not used for any such designs against India," he told CNN-IBN on Wednesday.

Disorderly conduct

Afghanistan's lower house of parliament, the Wolesi Jirga, was adjourned abruptly on Wednesday following a scuffle between members of parliament and security forces whom Speaker Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi had called to expel a lawmaker who was causing a disturbance (Pajhwok). The Wolesi Jirga is sharply divided over whether or not to summon Finance Minister Hazrat Omar Zakhilwal over accusations that he failed to take advisors on foreign trips, was nepotistic in his appointments, misused his authority, gave contradictory budget figures in 2011, and collected money for President Karzai's election campaign.

Suspected insurgents joined an anti-Pakistan protest in Kandahar City on Wednesday, where they opened fire at Afghan forces nearby (Pajhwok). Eleven people were killed in the return fire from security forces, including at least eight suspected militants.

An American soldier has been pulled from the front lines in the northern Afghan province of Kunar after locals complained last week that they had seen him throw rocks at a poster of President Hamid Karzai (NYT). Fortunately, the incident did not spark any clashes between villagers and U.S. forces, but it did reveal the frustration with the war that is simmering on both the Afghan and U.S. sides.

#PrayersforImranKhan

In contrast with the often-vitriolic campaign rhetoric seen these days in Pakistan, Imran Khan's fall on Tuesday sparked a flood of get-well messages from politicians and the public alike, both in speeches and on social media (ET). Nawaz Sharif began a live statement on Geo TV with a request for prayers for Khan, while supporters tweeted messages of encouragement and even waited in tears outside the hospital for news on his condition.

-- Jennifer Rowland

There seems to be some disagreement between Pakistan's extremists over participation in the May 11 elections. Pakistani Taliban spokesperson Ehsanullah Ehsan recently told Pakistanis to boycott the elections because democracy is un-Islamic, while Maulana Sami ul-Haq, a conservative cleric who runs a religious seminary that trained many Afghan and Pakistani Taliban, said in a follow-up statement that voting is a religious obligation.   

Could it be that the Taliban's brutal attacks on politicians belonging to the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) coalition have actually been detrimental to the wider extremist movement in Pakistan? The attacks definitely handicap religious parties, who often share sympathies and ideologies with the Taliban, at a time when they could potentially capitalize on staunch public disappointment with the outgoing government's performance.

While religious parties lost big in the 2008 elections, they probably anticipated some role for themselves in the next government, which is likely to be led by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, a conservative political party known for its own "special relationship" with extremists. Religious parties were further bolstered by a survey conducted by the British Council earlier this year revealing that 38 percent of Pakistani youth surveyed believed Islamic law is better suited for Pakistan than democracy.

Instead, Taliban attacks have likely increased chances of a high sympathy vote for the secular parties, a dynamic that helped usher in the PPP coalition in 2008 following the tragic death of Benazir Bhutto.

Why is it, though, that the extremists are not speaking with one voice? The commonsense - and most likely - argument is that they are just plain unorganized. Even though many of Haq's students joined the Taliban movement, it's doubtful that he has direct influence over the Taliban command and control structure - hence the very public statements contradicting the official Taliban position.

Let's not forget that Haq is a politician who leads his own political party and previously served in the Senate. His statements are more a warning for his former students than anyone else to not ruin his chances or those of the others who have been sitting on the sidelines for several years. A return to politics means a chance to advance the ideological agenda of the religious right, but it also allows individuals like Haq and his friends to benefit from state resources, foreign aid flows, and other "perks" of being in power.   

No one expects the religious right to take over...yet. Religious parties never have much success in Pakistani elections. Furthermore, the likelihood of a General Zia ul-Haq figure emerging on the scene is low. Zia, the military dictator who introduced a conservative interpretation of shariah law in several areas of Pakistani culture and law, began the trend of mixing religion with politics as a tool of state power. The approach engendered a vast network of militants that fought mostly Pakistan's battles while invoking the name of Islam; some were also used by the United States in pushing the Soviet Union out of Afghanistan, while others advanced their own sectarian agendas. 

While no one can compete with Zia's quasi-theocratic feat at the moment, religion and politics still mix - and badly. Pakistan's long relationship with militants and its cooperation with the United States in Afghanistan after September 11, 2001 have engendered a new breed of religious right - those against the state, namely the Pakistani Taliban in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

It is because of this shift in the state's relationship with militants that the Pakistani military has a clear interest in strengthening the religious right's political chances. Could the likes of Sami ul-Haq and other religious political parties convince the Pakistani Taliban to stop attacking the Pakistani military, secular politicians, and ordinary citizens? Don't bet money on it, but in February the Taliban did say they would participate in talks with the military if they would be mediated by one of the following individuals: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz President Nawaz Sharif, Jamaat-e-Islami leader Syed Munawar Hasan, or Jamiat-Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman.

The talks did not happen. Instead, the Pakistani military began an operation in the Tirah Valley where numerous security officials and militants have died. It is becoming harder and harder for the Pakistani military to respond to battlefield challenges by militants who now want access to the ballot box too. In addition to militant leader Hafeez Saeed's new "political career," dozens of individuals with alleged links to militant organizations have filed papers for the elections.

The entrée of such unsavory characters into Pakistani politics would not be a first, but it would be the wrong direction for a country that is still testing a rapidly evolving democratic culture and also trying to clarify the role of religion in politics. Islam, after all, is inextricable from Pakistan's history. The country was formed in 1947 as part of a political push by Muhammad Ali Jinnah to establish a homeland for the Indian subcontinent's impoverished Muslims. General Kayani, Chief of Army Staff, reiterated this point last week when he told the country's premier military academy that "Pakistan was created in the name of Islam and Islam can never be taken out of Pakistan."

Many believed Kayani's remarks justified religious extremism. This can hardly be the whole truth given the losses the military has suffered fighting the Pakistani Taliban. But the skepticism provoked by his remarks illustrates just how damaged religion and politics has become in Pakistan.

If extremists can take advantage of this characterization of Pakistan to advance their violent agendas, then surely the country's secular parties and government institutions can strengthen themselves against the militant threat in the name of Islam as well. But with extremists such as the members of the banned sectarian group, Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat, fielding candidates in this week's elections, such progress does not appear imminent.

Shamila N. Chaudhary is a South Asia analyst at the Eurasia Group and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation. She served as director for Pakistan and Afghanistan at the White House National Security Council from 2010-2011.

When Amb. James Dobbins arrives at the ground-floor offices of the State Department's Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan he will find a depleted staff, a moribund peace process and a mandate riddled with colossal diplomatic challenges. Secretary of State John Kerry called today's state of affairs a "pivotal moment" for the two nations. But it is also a critical moment for U.S. involvement in ending the conflict President Barack Obama once called the war "that we have to win" and now wants only to "responsibly" wind down.

Dobbins is a veteran of uphill assignments.  He oversaw the return of the American flag over a newly reopened U.S. Embassy in Kabul in 2001.  In addition to Afghanistan, he has served in Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti, and Somalia.  Not exactly a list of luxe diplomatic posts.

As Dobbins prepares to assume his post on 23^rd St, a series of open questions await his attention. Three of the biggest are below.

1)    Troops: Just how many U.S. troops will remain in Afghanistan after 2014?  That question remains unanswered as the United States continues to negotiate an agreement with Afghanistan on the shape of the U.S. military presence post-2014. Gen. James Mattis, who most recently served as the commander of U.S. Central Command, is on the record pushing for more than 13,000 troops. Most numbers out of the Pentagon and the White House come in at less than that.  The State Department's Robert Blake noted recently that "we are still in the process of thinking through what our final military presence will be in Afghanistan after the end of the transition at the end of 2014." Exactly when that will be and what shape it will take remains to be seen.

Also an open question: how many Afghan troops will be needed? And how many will be funded? Those two numbers may well end up being different. And the latter should be known sooner rather than later.

2)    Peace process: Right now there is not one of substance to speak of. What shape might one take? The window for action is rapidly closing as frustration between Pakistan and Afghanistan remains very much alive, with Afghanistan arguing that Pakistan looks favorably on Afghan instability. Will Afghanistan and Pakistan agree to agree on conditions for talks?  And what role will the Americans take? Sec. Kerry met last month in Belgium with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Pakistani General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and vowed to "under-promise but deliver" as the sides "continue a very specific dialogue on both the political track as well as the security track." What, if anything, the dialed-down dialog yields will be watched carefully as nearly all sides agree that a diplomatic solution - one in which human rights are not made the price of peace - is the lone shot at a lasting and durable peace.

3)    Transition: whither and at what pace will security, political and economic transitions continue? So far, the economic transition has been bolstered by GDP numbers that have been better than expected.  As the World Bank noted, "rapid economic growth" has been accompanied by "relatively low inflation."  But the government is overwhelmingly dependent on foreign coffers for its funding -- civilian aid alone is "estimated at more than US$6 billion a year, or nearly 40 percent of GDP" - and as those dollars dry up, the questions of stability and security arise immediately.  A recent IMF report mentioned by the New York Times notes that tax evasion, corruption and declining growth all mean that the government will find it tough to pay even half of its bills this year. Stories of graft and CIA-filled slush funds do not lead to greater confidence in the Afghan government from either the American public paying for it or the Afghan people who will pay the price of chaos and a political power vacuum.

These are only the most pressing of a rash of questions sure to occupy Amb. Dobbins on Day One.  Fortunately for both Sec. Kerry and Amb. Dobbins, the SRAP position does not require Senate confirmation, so they can get down to work quickly - as they must. The U.S. is speeding toward the end of the NATO combat mission, and both diplomats will soon be hard-pressed to find answers.

Gayle Tzemach Lemmon is fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and author of The Dressmaker of Khair Khana.

It's been a rough month for Pervez Musharraf.

Since returning to Pakistan on March 24 after several years of self-imposed exile, the former president has been disqualified from participating in the May 11 national election; arrested on multiple charges; and targeted by a car bomb that failed to detonate. His travails have garnered little sympathy from the masses. They've either ignored him (his homecoming rally attracted less than 2,000 people), or lashed out at him (a lawyer hurled a shoe at him during a court appearance).

Musharraf's life is in limbo. His political career is on hold (and, following a court decision on April 30 to ban him from elections for life, perhaps over altogether). He also can't leave his Islamabad estate (where, as of this writing, he is under house arrest) except for his visits to court-trips fraught with peril for one of Pakistan's most marked men.

Musharraf has long been aware of the legal problems and security threats he would face if he returned to Pakistan. So why would he give up the relative freedom and safety of Dubai and London to come home?

Some observers point to the deep influence of delusional advisors. Others say he wants to demonstrate his patriotism and loyalty to a nation he ingloriously abandoned. And still others suggest he simply isn't very smart.

Yet the best explanation is his outsize ego.

I won't soon forget the day back in July 2011, just weeks after U.S. Navy Seals apprehended Osama Bin Laden, when Musharraf gave a talk to a beyond-capacity crowd at the Wilson Center. He declared that he had few regrets about his time in power, and insisted that if he were to take power again, "I would not need to reinvent the wheel"-because what he had done while president had been successful.

This breathtaking assertion came from a man who launched media crackdowns, fired the chief justice of Pakistan's Supreme Court, declared a state of emergency, and eventually resigned after becoming the target of a lawyers-led anti-government movement described by some as Pakistan's Arab Spring. So controversial (and unpopular) were these actions that, for many Pakistanis, they overshadow the positive accomplishments that Musharraf made earlier in his rule-including economic growth and media liberalization.

With Pakistan now a fragile, civilian-led democracy, the former military strongman's hubris has apparently convinced him that he can reinvent himself as a very different kind of leader.

It's a persona I've seen him assume firsthand. After his talk at the Wilson Center, as security officers attempted to lead him out of the building, Musharraf mingled with the crowd. He shook hands, slapped backs, and laughed heartily as onlookers chanted "March 23, 2012! March 23, 2012!"-the date on which he was then promising (falsely, as it turned out) to return to Pakistan. It was a command performance for the former leader of an institution known for its contemptuous references to "bloody civilians."

In more recent weeks, Musharraf has gone to extraordinary lengths to come off as a man of the people. He live-tweeted his return to Pakistan, and photos posted on his various social media accounts show him lifting weights and playing with his German shepherd.

Yet even as Musharraf's new image distances him from the military, he continues to embrace that institution's ideologies-including the idea that he can rescue Pakistan from itself. In his very first remarks after returning home, Musharraf proclaimed he had come back to "save" Pakistan.  When deployed as an army institutional narrative, this messiah mentality has been used to justify military rule. Yet when appropriated by individuals, it becomes a highly narcissistic claim to legitimacy (it's a tactic also employed by Imran Khan, who has vowed "to launch a jihad to save Pakistan").

Musharraf's bombast may seem ridiculous given his dim political prospects (the latter can be explained, in part, by his unpopular, dictatorial end-of-rule policies; his decision to establish a post-9/11 partnership with Washington, which makes many Pakistanis regard him as a "poodle" of the United States; and his weak and unorganized new political party, the All Pakistan Muslim League). Musharraf's bombast has also prompted some to claim that his decision to return betrays a lack of strategic thinking (the same deficiency seen in his decision nearly 15 years ago to launch an ill-fated military incursion into the Kargil district of Kashmir).

Yet in fact, Musharraf's return was well-thought-out-and, in the narrow context of electoral politics, perfectly rational and even quite reasonable.

His plan was to contest a parliamentary seat in Chitral, a district in the mountainous northern reaches of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province-one of the few pockets of the country where Musharraf enjoys considerable levels of popularity. (Few public opinion surveys have focused on Musharraf in recent years, but a poll released just the other day finds that about two-thirds of Pakistanis support his electoral disqualification.) Early in April, after his nomination papers were accepted in Chitral (he would be disqualified just days later), locals responded with a celebratory procession, and a local journalist reported that people were "ecstatic." Political analysts critical of Musharraf grudgingly acknowledged that other potential national assembly candidates from Chitral were, in deference to Musharraf, opting for provincial seats instead.

Musharraf's popularity in Chitral can be traced to his administration's construction of the Lowari Tunnel-a five-mile-long structure that protects locals from avalanches that buried thousands of people in past years. In the winter months, the tunnel enables isolated, snow-bound Chitralis to travel to other parts of Pakistan without having to depend on a dangerous and more circuitous route through Afghanistan. "I don't care what Musharraf did with anyone else," proclaimed one Chitrali last year, "but if I as Chitrali neglected his services for Chitral, I will never be forgiven in any court in this world."

One candidate running for the Chitral seat has claimed that he, not Musharraf, deserves credit for the tunnel. Yet other politicians-including a chief official with the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, the party led by Musharraf nemesis Nawaz Sharif that many expect to lead this year's polls-have rushed to Musharraf's defense, crediting him with constructing more than two-thirds of the tunnel during his rule.

In sum, Musharraf chose the only remotely realistic route back to politics-a parliamentary seat in a district where he commands modest levels of support. His vanity enabled him to push forward with this plan while blinding him to the legal problems that have long threatened to snuff out any hopes of a political comeback.

Michael Kugelman is the senior program associate for South Asia at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, DC. He can be reached at michael.kugelman@wilsoncenter.org or on Twitter @michaelkugelman.