Pakistan: Candidates supported by Imran Khan’s PTI formally join the Sunni Ittehad Council
Islamabad: In an attempt to form the federal and some provincial governments, nearly all of the candidates from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, led by the imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan, have officially joined the right-wing Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) by submitting their affidavits to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). Due to the party’s electoral symbol—a cricket bat—being rejected, they were unable to participate in the elections directly.
106 members of the Punjab Assembly, nine members of the Sindh Assembly, 85 members of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, and 89 candidates for the National Assembly all filed affidavits on Wednesday, Dawn said. On Monday, the PTI said that it has reached a “formal agreement” with SIC to get its fair number of seats that are designated for women and minorities.
Gohar and Omar did not submit affidavits.
Three party leaders—Barrister Gohar Khan, Omar Ayub Khan, the PTI’s candidate for prime minister, and Ali Amin Gandapur—failed to file affidavits, and the ECP had not yet announced the candidacy of another.
Omar and Gohar filed these papers knowingly because they want to run in the PTI intraparty elections. As the PTI’s nominee for chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Gandapur chose not to register.
According to reports, the PTI intends to hold its intra-party elections in a fortnight. According to sources in the local media, Gohar has been named as the chairman and Raoof Hassan as the Chief Election Commissioner for the PTI’s intra-party elections. Following a military-backed crackdown, the electoral watchdog invalidated their last internal elections, stripping them of their emblem and forcing party candidates to run as independents.
forming a coalition government
The candidates supported by imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party won the most seats in the National Assembly in an unexpected display of strength; nevertheless, they were unable to form a government as the party had lost its electoral symbol. The PTI, led by 71-year-old Imran, helped the majority of independent candidates win 93 seats in the National Assembly.
But after weeks of talks, Nawaz Sharif’s Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and Bilawal Bhutto’s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) agreed on a power-sharing arrangement to form a coalition, and Pakistan is poised to see the establishment of its second coalition administration. The PPP secured 54 seats, placing third, behind the PML-N’s 75 seats. With 17 seats, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement Pakistan (MQM-P) would provide support to both parties.
After the contentious elections clouded by accusations of electoral manipulation, the coalition may be able to prevent their fiercest adversary, Imran Khan, from becoming office. The PTI has said that the country would not accept the “PDM 2.0” and that the PML-N and PPP will establish the government with a stolen mandate. In a parody of the Constitution and the law, it also claimed that the top election commissioner was supporting the “regime change conspiracy.”
According to a party spokesman, it is outrageous and intolerable that a group that has been “rejected by the nation” has come together once again to perform a “drama” of PDM 2.0 in the nation, Dawn said. According to him, the people have awarded the PTI a resounding majority of 180 seats in the National Assembly, as shown in Form 45s.
The party spokeswoman said, “It is past time we took a lesson from history and respected the public mandate, as Pakistan had to go through a tragedy like the fall of Dhaka as a result of daylight poll fraud.”
“A new era”: Maryam Nawaz of the PML-N in the province of Punjab
Maryam, the daughter of PML-N supremo Nawaz Sharif and the party’s candidate for chief minister of Punjab, said that a “new era” will begin for the province in accordance with the customs and models that her father and PM candidate Shehbaz Sharif set while serving as chief ministers.
According to her, the PML-N has a “clear majority” in the province. Maryam will be the first female chief minister in Pakistan’s history—more than seven decades—if she is elected. More over half of Pakistan’s population, or over 127 million people, live in the province that she will take over.
“I congratulate the people of Punjab for giving us a resounding majority in this difficult election.” We’re going to break records for service; I haven’t slept since the election results, and we’re all going to have to work together,” she said, promising to do her responsibilities to the best of people’s expectations.
The alliance said on Tuesday that PPP co-chair Asif Ali Zardari will run for president in the next election, while PML-N president Shehbaz Sharif would be nominated for the position of prime minister. The PPP has requested to be appointed to high positions in Shehbaz Sharif’s government, including Senate chairman and deputy NA speaker, but has denied to join the party.
