Gilgit-Baltistan Elections: A Three-Current Analysis Republic Policy Think Tank
Tahir Maqsood Chheena
To understand what the recent elections in Gilgit-Baltistan truly reveal, it is insufficient to count seats alone. Seats are outcomes; votes are intentions. A proper reading of these results requires an analysis of popular vote distribution, underlying political trends, and the organizational capacities of the competing parties. When examined through this lens, three distinct political currents emerge from these elections, each telling a different story about the nature of Pakistani politics in 2025.
The first current belonged to the Pakistan Peoples Party. The PPP is not merely a party in Gilgit-Baltistan: it is a political institution with deep cultural and historical roots in the region. Its organizational presence, locally embedded leadership, and long-standing political traditions gave it a structural advantage that no other party could replicate in the short term. Equally important, the PPP did not encounter the same barriers to campaigning and voter outreach that constrained other parties. It was able to operate freely, mobilize its base, and project itself as a coherent political force. The result was a credible electoral performance driven not by circumstance but by sustained organizational investment over years. This is the lesson the PPP’s result offers: durable political capital is built slowly and cannot be manufactured during a campaign.
The second current, and arguably the most consequential, was the personal popularity of Imran Khan. If any single political figure commanded the deepest public acceptance across Gilgit-Baltistan’s varied terrain, it was Imran Khan. His appeal transcended geography, ethnicity, and traditional party loyalty. Yet the elections also exposed a critical structural gap: the distance between Imran Khan as a political phenomenon and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf as a functioning political organization. The PTI faced compounding challenges: organizational weaknesses, uneven candidate selection, fragile party structures, and an operating environment shaped by sustained institutional pressure. The space available for the PTI to function as a genuinely independent electoral force remained constrained. Despite these conditions, Imran Khan’s vote bank remained measurably present. His supporters came out. The problem was not the absence of political will among voters but the absence of an organizational machinery capable of converting that will into complete electoral victories. Popular leadership without institutional depth produces admirable vote tallies but inconsistent seat counts. This is the central contradiction the PTI must resolve if it is to translate its undeniable public support into stable political power.
The third current was associated with the Pakistan Muslim League (N), which entered these elections carrying the distinct advantage of incumbency at the federal level. In the politics of Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir, the influence of the federal government has historically been a decisive variable. Proximity to state resources, administrative leverage, and the ability to shape the conditions of an election have, in past cycles, translated reliably into electoral outcomes. The PML-N held all of these advantages. Yet the most significant finding of this election, when results are measured by popular votes rather than seat tallies, is that the PML-N suffered the most severe electoral setback of any major party. Despite controlling the federal government, it failed to convert its political position into popular endorsement. Votes, not seats, reveal political legitimacy. By that measure, the PML-N underperformed in a manner that demands serious internal reflection.
This outcome raises a question the party cannot afford to defer. If its performance was this limited in Gilgit-Baltistan even with federal incumbency as a structural advantage, what can it reasonably expect in future provincial elections conducted under genuinely competitive and independent conditions? The honest answer is that the PML-N’s political footprint outside Punjab has already narrowed considerably. The party retains organizational and electoral dominance within Punjab, but its presence across the rest of the country has contracted to the point where it functions more as a regional force than a national one. The Gilgit-Baltistan results are not an anomaly in this pattern; they are a confirmation of it. The party will need to examine, with analytical seriousness, why its public appeal continues to decline in regions where it does not benefit from the organizational and administrative advantages it commands in Punjab.
Taken together, these three currents produce a picture that is richer and more instructive than a simple seat count would suggest. The PPP gained through organizational strength. The PTI revealed the paradox of mass popularity disconnected from institutional capacity. The PML-N demonstrated that federal incumbency is no longer the electoral guarantor it once was in these territories.
Beyond party-specific lessons, the Gilgit-Baltistan elections have also challenged one of the most durable conventions in Pakistani regional politics: the assumption that elections in Gilgit-Baltistan and Azad Kashmir will naturally favor whichever party controls the federal government at the time. This convention has historically reflected the structural dependence of these territories on federal patronage, administrative influence, and resource allocation. The PTI’s performance has disrupted this assumption. Even while operating under sustained political and institutional pressure, even without the administrative levers available to a governing party, the PTI emerged as the largest political force measured by popular votes. This is not a trivial result. It suggests that voter preferences in these regions are becoming less susceptible to top-down influence and more reflective of genuine popular sentiment. That is a development of significant long-term consequence for Pakistani democracy.
The most important political lesson of these elections, therefore, is not about which party won the most seats. It is about what the vote distribution reveals. It reveals that the PPP’s organizational model remains a reference point for sustainable regional politics. It reveals that Imran Khan’s public support is deep, resilient, and not easily suppressed by institutional obstacles. And it reveals that the PML-N must confront the reality that federal power alone cannot substitute for genuine public legitimacy. Elections, in the end, measure not what parties possess but what voters choose. In Gilgit-Baltistan, the voters have spoken with considerable clarity.
