(VOVworld) - Tens of millions of Pakistanis voted on Saturday in local government elections for the first time in ten years, in polls seen as a referendum to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) party through its term. 

Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif (Photo: Xinhua/ VNA)

Elections are being held in two of Pakistan's four provinces - the central province of Punjab and southern province of Sindh. Pakistan's other two provinces held local elections months ago. Opposition leader Imran Khan won in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the northwest and Sharif's party and its coalition partners won in the sparsely populated western province of Baluchistan. Observers are closely watching the polls in Punjab, Pakistan's richest and most populous province and the power base of Sharif, who swept to national power in a landslide election in 2013.