Kuwait City: Kuwaiti civil servant Nasser Ahmed sits in a luxurious tent, taking advantage of the perks of election campaigning in the emirate seen as a pioneer of democracy in the Gulf.
The middle-aged Ahmed has been worried that austerity measures initiated after oil prices fell sharply will gnaw away at his salary and benefits.
But despite those concerns, and the candidate's fiery speech, Ahmed enjoyed an opulent open-buffet dinner put out by the host, a tradition in this wealthy Gulf state.
"I am just wondering if this one will finally bring stability," he said in reference to a series of political crises that have rocked the OPEC member since mid-2006.
During that decade, the parliament has been dissolved five times by the Amir due to political disputes and twice by courts over procedural flaws.
The most recent occasion the Amir exercised those powers was last month when he called a snap election following a crisis over petrol price hikes.
Ahmed was among hundreds of men and women attending a rally put on in Kuwait City ahead of Saturday's election.
Candidates routinely spend millions of dollars on rallies, meals and even on alleged vote-buying, observers and analysts say.
Pledges range from promises to improve health services to complicated political issues, like urging an end to internal feuds within the ruling Al-Sabah family, in power for 250 years.
In 1962, Kuwait became the first Gulf Arab state to draft a constitution and introduce parliamentary elections.
However, the Amir still enjoys tremendous powers and the ruling family holds major cabinet positions including that of the premier.
Often described as a half democracy, Kuwait's political system is part parliamentary and part presidential.
The elected parliament enjoys legislative and monitoring powers including grilling the premier and ministers and voting them out of office on an individual basis, but it cannot oust the entire cabinet.
Kuwait's democracy has been marred by disputes which intensified in the past decade with the opposition holding massive street protests demanding reforms that would effectively limit the ruling family's powers.
Disputes between the government and lawmakers have been blamed for hindering development projects.
Despite its shortcomings, Kuwait's democracy offers relative freedoms of the press and expression.
Women have enjoyed full political rights since 2005, and have since been elected to parliament and appointed to the cabinet. There are 14 women running for office among 300 candidates.
This year's campaign has been dominated by economic issues after the government increased the prices of fuel and services.
With a native population of just 1.3 million people and pumping about 3.0 million barrels of oil per day, Kuwait has offered its citizens generous welfare conditions including high wages and no taxes.
The idea of changing that and taxing citizens or controlling their wages has had a major impact on society.
"I will propose a law in the next parliament to ban the government from reducing subsidies or touching the salaries of Kuwaitis," former lawmaker Abdulkarim al-Kundari told an election rally.
An overwhelming majority of candidates have issued similar pledges.