Pakistan tense on election eve

ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Pakistani politicians were makingfinal preparations on Sunday for a general election the nextday that could usher in a parliament intent on forcing U.S.ally President Pervez Musharraf from power.

Authorities imposed a curfew in a northwestern town after40 were killed in a suicide bomb attack on supporters ofassassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto on Saturday.

Fears of militant violence have overshadowed the campaign,which officially ended at midnight on Saturday, especiallyafter opposition leader Bhutto was killed in a gun and bombattack on December 27 as she left a rally in Rawalpindi.

Voting was postponed from January 8 after Bhutto's death,which raised fears about the nuclear-armed country's stability.

Saturday's suicide blast in Parachinar, near the Afghanborder, was the most bloody attack in the campaign and lookedbound to compound fears of election-day violence that analystssay could hurt turnout.

"The election won't make any difference. There's no chanceof any improvement as long as Musharraf is around," said AhmedKhan, a 33-year-old shopkeeper in the town of Taxila, nearIslamabad.

Former army chief Musharraf is not taking part in theelections for a new parliament and provincial assemblies buthis rule looks set to be a decisive factor.

A hostile parliament could challenge Musharraf's Octoberre-election for another five-year term by legislators whichcritics said was unconstitutional. That could herald turmoil.

Musharraf's popularity was hurt when he tried to dismissthe country's top judge in March, then took a dive in Novemberwhen he imposed six weeks of emergency rule to stymie legalchallenges to his re-election.

SYMPATHY, RIGGING

Other decisive factors, analysts say, will be the strengthof a sympathy vote for Bhutto's Pakistan People's Party (PPP)and the degree of rigging.

The PPP and the other main opposition party, led by formerprime minister Nawaz Sharif, who Musharraf ousted in a 1999coup, have complained of widespread rigging by Musharraf'sallies and they have vowed protests if they are robbed ofvictory.

Musharraf, who retired from the army in November, rejectscomplaints of rigging and says procedures have been refined toprevent cheating. He says he is ready to work with whicheverparty forms a government and chooses a prime minister.

He said on Saturday the vote would be fair and peaceful andhe hoped for a stable government that would focus on tacklingterrorism and economic growth. Many Pakistanis blame thegovernment for rising prices and shortages of staples.

Militant violence, especially in the northwest, has surgedsince July when troops stormed a radical mosque in Islamabad.

Islamic parties are expected to fare badly but that is moreto do with their failure to bring improvement in North WestFrontier Province where they have ruled since the last electionin 2002, analysts say.

Polls open at 8 a.m. (3 a.m. British time) and close at 5p.m. (12 p.m. British time).

Ballots will be counted in polling stations where they arecast and results are expected to start coming out towardsmidnight on Monday.

The trend in the battleground province of Punjab, wherehalf the members of parliament will be elected, should be clearlate on Tuesday morning, with unofficial results out later inthe day.

But with none of the main parties -- the PPP, thepro-Musharraf Pakistan Muslim League (PML) and Sharif'sPakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) -- expected to secure amajority, a coalition between two of the three is likely.

Sharif's party has said it will not enter government aslong as Musharraf is president, while the PPP has left optionsopen.

Party leaders were holding final meetings with candidatesand planning final news conferences, party officials said.

Nearly 81 million people, about half the population, areregistered to vote. Several hundred foreign observers andthousands of Pakistani observers will be monitoring the votebut they have not been allowed to conduct exit polls.

A European Union team is due to give a preliminaryassessment on Tuesday.

(To read more about the Pakistan election visit the Reutersblog "Pakistan: Now or Never?" athttp://blogs.reuters.com/pakistan/)

(Writing by Robert Birsel; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)