1. Only 30% of the respondents believe the General Election 2013 to be somewhat to completely rigged at the end of the 2nd year, compared to 37% in the 1st year

2. 51% of the respondents rate highly the current Government�s performance in ensuring democratic oversight of the security sector

3. PML-N garners highest Approval Rating, with 70% of the respondents rating the party�s competence highly; Approval Ratings of PTI and PPP at 44% and 36% respectively

4. Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif remains the most trusted leader with an Approval Rating of 75%; Mr. Imran Khan garners an Approval Rating of 49%, while Mr. Asif Ali Zardari of 27%

5. The Armed Forces most trusted institution with an Approval Rating of 75%, while Police the least trusted with an Approval Rating of 32%

October 19; At the completion of the second year of the current Parliament and Provincial Assemblies, 66% of the respondents approve of the Overall Quality of Democracy in Pakistan.

These public views are part of a Nationwide Public Opinion Poll by PILDAT on assessing citizens� views on Quality of Democracy in Pakistan at the end of the 2nd year of the current Federal and Provincial Legislatures elected after General Election 2013. ¹

On 11 core indicators measuring quality of democracy in Pakistan, 6 show positive approval rating while 5 are rated negatively. Respondents have given above 50% approval rating to Independence of Media (64%), Effectiveness of Supreme Court (56%), Trust in Favourite Political Party (56%), Performance of Independent Cabinet (52%), and Democratic Oversight of Security Sector (51%). Approval Ratings for these 11 core democracy indicators for both the surveys conducted at the end of the 1st and 2nd year of the Government can be seen in Table 1.

Table 1: Comparison of Approval Ratings at the Completion of the 1st and 2nd Year of the Elected Parliament & Provincial Assemblies

Figure 1: High Scoring Core Democracy Indicators: Approval Ratings 2015

Figure 2: Low Scoring Core Democracy Indicators: Approval Ratings 2015

59% of the respondents believe that the General Election in 2013 was somewhat to completely transparent and fair. On the contrast 30% respondents see the Election as somewhat to completely rigged. For the democracy survey conducted at the end of the 1st year of the elected Governments, 53% of the respondents believed that General Election 2013 were completely to somewhat transparent and fair and 37% thought they were somewhat to completely rigged.

Performance of Major Political Parties

Signifying decreasing support with Pakistan�s political parties, 56% of the respondents stated that they retain �Very High� to �High� level of trust in their favourite political party at the end of the 2nd year, in comparison to 64% at the end of the 1st year. Additionally, the Approval Rating for trust in political parties as an institution remained low, with only 36% of the respondents expressing their approval for it.

The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) had the highest approval amongst the population, with 70% of the respondents rating the party�s competence highly. The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) followed at an Approval Rating of 44% The Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and the Pakistan Peoples Party were approved of by 40% and 36% of the respondents respectively.

In contrast, all other political parties included in this poll generated relatively lower approval levels of their competence. The MQM emerged as the most negatively rated political party in the country with an Approval Rating 14%. Dr. Tahir-ul-Qadri�s Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) received a relatively low rating at 19%, the Awami National Party (ANP) was favourably voted for by 21% and the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl-ur-Rehman (JUI-F) had only slightly higher Approval Ratings at 23%.

Figure 3: Performance of Political Parties

Trust in Leaders

A review of the current leadership of the country shows that the people of Pakistan have contrasting views on the most trustworthy leaders in the country.

Of the political leadership in the country, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif emerged as the most popular political leader with an approval rating of 75%. Mr. Muhammad Shahbaz Sharif, the Chief Minister of the Punjab is not far behind at an Approval Rating of 72%. Mr. Imran Khan, Chairman PTI, has garnered an approval of 49%.

Other national political leaders that the poll included had relatively lower ratings. Mr. Altaf Hussain emerged as the least popular leader in Pakistan with an approval rating of 13%. Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain also earned substantially lower ratings at 19 %, followed closely by Mr. Asfandyar Wali at 18%. Mr. Asif Zardari, Co-Chairman of the PPP earned a similarly weak Approval Rating of 27%.

A comparison of Approval Ratings of national leaders, for the survey conducted at the end of the 1st and 2nd year of the current elected Governments is given in Figure 4.

Figure 4: Trust in Leaders

Trust in Institutions

Respondents from across Pakistan were also asked to assert their level of approval in terms of how democratic major national institutions were. The data presented in Table 2 provides an indication of the most and least trusted institutions in the country, along with providing a comparison of Approval Ratings for the survey conducted at the end of the 1st and 2nd year of the current elected Governments.

Figure 5: Trust in Institutions: Approval Ratings 2015

Table 2: Trust in Institutions: Approval Ratings 2014 and 2015

Pakistan�s Armed Forces are seen as the most trustworthy institution, with an approval rating of 75%. In comparison, this Approval Rating stood at 73% by the end of the 1st year.

Similarly, the Supreme and High Courts of Pakistan earned a strong Approval Rating of 63% while the Print and Electronic Media also generated high Approval Ratings of 55 % and 54% respectively. The National Assembly was characteristic of an Approval Rating of 49%, followed by the Civil Courts (Lower Courts) at 43%. The Election Commission of Pakistan was able to earn an approval rating of 37%.

In contrast to the robust trust in the Armed Forces and media by the people of Pakistan, Political Parties (in contrast to the indicator of Trust in Favourite Political Party) and the Police had lower ratings of 36% and 32 % respectively.

Local Governments

A substantial 80% of the respondents say that holding Local Government elections nationwide are somewhat to very important. Only 11% of the respondents believe that holding these elections is not very important or not important at all. Public opinion in favour of holding Local Government elections has seen a clear increase, as by the end of the 1st year of the Federal and Provincial Governments in May 2014, this number stood at 71%, whereas 27% of the respondents believed that holding these elections is not very important or important at all. On the other hand, 72% of respondents believe that elected Local Governments are somewhat to very important in solving the problems faced by Pakistani Citizens, whereas by the end of the 1st year, only 65% of the respondents believed this to be the case. Only 19% asserted that elected Local Governments are not important in resolving the problems faced by citizens by the end of the 2nd year.

Approval Ratings of Various Indicators in Performance of the National Assembly

The National Assembly received the highest rating regarding its function of law making with 55% respondents giving a high approval rating on the issue. In all of its other functions however, the National Assembly received low ratings.42% gave the Assembly a high approval rating on improving relations between the Federal Government and Opposition, 40% gave it a high approval rating on Oversight of Government actions, and only 39% gave a high approval rating on the Prime Minister�s attendance in the National Assembly.

Provincial Breakdown of Quality of Democracy Indicators

With regards to the provincial breakdown of the quality of democracy indicators, Punjab and Balochistan differ in their lowest Approval Rating of the core Quality of Democracy Indicators. In Balochistan, the lowest approval was registered on Respect for Human Rights (28%); a perennial and somewhat legitimate concern of the people of Balochistan, while in Punjab the least approval was registered on Effectiveness of the Bureaucracy (31%).

An important point to note here is the high Approval Rating on Effectiveness of the Federal Cabinet (58%) recorded in Balochistan. This score supports the idea that the people of Balochistan are increasingly becoming more comfortable with the democratic set-up at the Federal level, and are fully supportive of retaining a democratic political system in the country.

The lowest approval rate in Sindh was also recorded on Effectiveness of the Bureaucracy (32%). Moreover Safeguarding Sovereignty of the State (36%) was rated poorly by the people of Sindh. The only high Approval Ratings were registered on Independence of Media (72%) and Overall Quality of Democracy (69%).

The people of KP gave the highest approval to Trust in Favourite Political Party (82%). This rating can be taken as evidence for strong support for the current system of democracy, as well as its qualitative performance over the last two years. The only low rating from the province was recorded on Effectiveness of the Bureaucracy (44%). Given the lower approval ratings on this indicator from all four provinces, including Punjab, democratic governments at the centre and in provinces should invest their focus and energies into reforming the bureaucratic institutional infrastructure in the country.

The complete report titled Public Opinion on Quality of Democracy in Pakistan At the End of Second Year of Federal and Provincial Governments: June 2014-May 2015 can be accessed at: http://www.pildat.org/publications/publication/Democracy&LegStr/
PublicOpinionOnQualityofDemocracyinPakistan_October2015.pdf