LAHORE, Pakistan—The election here on Saturday is a fiercely contested three-way race that looks poised to solidify the nuclear-armed nation's transition to democracy even as it could further dent fragile relations with the U.S.

Players to Watch in Pakistan

Review some of the key players on Saturday's election.

The voting will follow the bloodiest election campaign in recent Pakistani history. Taliban militants killed more than 100 people as they sought to influence voters by launching attacks on the secular parties that dominated the outgoing government. They have also warned people to stay away from the polls.

The Pakistan Peoples Party of President Asif Ali Zardari is likely to lose much of its support, with the conservative Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif leading opinion polls. The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party of cricket legend Imran Khan, who boycotted the previous election in 2008, is also likely to emerge as a major—and possibly decisive—force in Saturday's vote, analysts and diplomats predict.

"A two-party system may be replaced by the birth of a multipolar one," said Maleeha Lodhi, a former Pakistani ambassador to Washington. "This is the tightest election Pakistan has seen since 1970 and potentially an election of upsets." The disputed vote in 1970 led to the breakup of Pakistan and the secession of what is now Bangladesh.

An election worker carries ballot boxes in Peshawar in preparations Friday for the Pakistani elections. Reuters

The campaigning was mostly about reviving Pakistan's moribund economy, ending chronic power outages and tackling corruption, which flourished during five years of civilian rule.

Still, the outcome is also likely to affect the degree of future cooperation between Pakistan and the U.S. in combating Islamist militancy, diplomats said.

On the campaign trail, Messrs. Sharif and Khan have both shied away from criticizing the Pakistani Taliban, saying they would open peace negotiations with the militants. The Taliban, in turn, have refrained from attacking PML-N and PTI rallies.

Mr. Khan, appealing to Pakistani nationalism, has also pledged to curtail security ties with the U.S., promising to shoot down American drones and saying that the Pakistani Taliban movement that is launching attacks here is merely a reaction to the U.S. occupation of neighboring Afghanistan.

"Let their forces leave Afghanistan. The narrative of jihad will be finished once America is out," explained Ejaz Ahmad Chaudhary, PTI's president for Punjab, the election's main battleground and the province that accounts for more than half of Parliament seats.

Ballot boxes and polling booths are transported Friday from a compound used as a storage area for election material in Lahore. Reuters

The election, in addition to picking the national government, will also choose Pakistan's four provincial administrations. If it leads to a successful democratic transition, the vote would cement Pakistan's status as the world's fifth-largest democracy, strengthening the elected authorities at the expense of the powerful military and intelligence establishment that often launched coups in the past.

But a contested or inconclusive result could open the way for more interference, as happened in 1977, the only other time in Pakistani history when an elected government served a full term—just to be ousted by the military following a controversial vote.

Police officers inspected a damaged election campaign office belonging to Pakistan People's Party, after a bomb blast in Quetta Friday injured five people. Reuters

Even though the Taliban have repeatedly pledged to disrupt Saturday's polls, decrying democracy as un-Islamic, Pakistani analysts and politicians are generally optimistic that this election will be one of the country's cleanest. The independent election commission has eliminated millions of phantom voters from electoral rolls, and barred practices such as the busing of voters by political parties. The vote is overseen by a neutral caretaker government.

"This is the first campaign where the real issues are being addressed, and it is the people who will decide and not the establishment," said prominent human-rights lawyer and democracy campaigner Asma Jahangir.

In fact, the campaign has largely focused on how to spur economic growth and curb graft. Relations with the U.S. or Pakistan's traditional enemy India were mentioned only in passing. If anything, almost all the candidates—and particularly Mr. Sharif—have pledged to warm up to Pakistan's giant eastern neighbor.

"Previously, we said—until the issue of Kashmir is resolved, no economic relations" with India, said PML-N Senior Vice President Sartaj Aziz, who served as finance and foreign minister in Mr. Sharif's governments in the 1990s. "But this has changed now. All of our leaders want to have good relations with India now."

Pakistani volunteers at a hospital shift the body of an independent election candidate who was killed Friday in Karachi. AFP/Getty Images

Already, real-estate prices have begun to climb in Lahore, Pakistan's second-largest city and Mr. Sharif's home, which sits less than an hour from the Indian border crossing. "Trade with India is likely to open up if he wins—and in that case Lahore will be the place to make investments," said Anis ul-Haq, Punjab secretary of the All-Pakistan Textile Mills Association, which represents the province's multibillion-dollar garments industry.

Under Pakistan's first-past-the-post system, similar to that of the U.K., voters on Saturday will pick individual candidates in the country's 271 national assembly seats. (Voting in a 272nd constituency has been postponed after the Taliban assassinated a candidate.)

While opinion polls predict that Mr. Sharif's PML-N will garner the most seats, it is unlikely to win an outright majority. In order to govern, he would need the support of independent candidates and possibly other major parties.

Diplomats say that a PML-N alliance with PPP, the former ruling party, could be a possibility if Mr. Khan's PTI does particularly well. Mr. Khan's has repeatedly said he wouldn't enter a coalition with the other two main parties, accusing them of ruining Pakistan.

A winning party will need to have "a very clear majority" to tackle the country's problems, Mr. Sharif said in an interview published Friday in Pakistan's Dawn newspaper. "A fractured mandate, a split mandate, would be worse than the last five years."



Pakistanis will be closely watching turnout numbers on Saturday. Participation higher than the usual rate of just above 40%, especially among the young voters, is likely to benefit Mr. Khan's PTI. "If the youth turns up in numbers, the result will be very clear," Mr. Chaudhary forecast.

On the streets of Lahore, where PML-N won by a landslide in 2008, there was clear evidence of PTI's rise, with the cricket star's portraits and picture of his bat—the party's electoral symbol—plastered on walls and cars.

"There is no hope with all the other parties. They have disappointed us, and there is no reason to bring them back," said Omar Ehsan, a 30-year-old co-owner of a jewelry store who said he plans to vote for PTI.

A street hawker outside, Mohammed Akram, was more wary of politicians' pledges. "I won't vote for anyone," Mr. Akram said. "Let's see who gets elected, and whether they fulfill their promises. If they do, they will get my vote next time."

Write to Yaroslav Trofimov at