Bad blood: Discord surfaces in political parties during ticket awarding process

Fissures appeared over the ‘wrong’ selection of candidates.

ABBOTABAD:

With the ticket awarding process for elections underway, discord in some mainstream political parties’ ranks has surfaced in certain constituencies of Hazara.

Fissures apparently appeared over the ‘wrong’ selection of candidates; ‘ignoring’ die hard workers and loyalists who claim to have stood by the leadership in difficult times. PK-46, Abbottabad-III, is one such constituency where the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) parliamentary board allegedly ignored loyalists like Malik Muhabbat Awan and Muhammad Ashfaq by awarding a ticket to Ayub Afridi.

This decision sent shockwaves throughout the party. Workers accused leaders of political immaturity and claimed the PML-N was deviating from its principles. They also accused Afridi of having fickle loyalties. According to popular belief, Afridi defected to Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid when the PML-N government was sent packing by Pervez Musharraf in 1999.

Enraged workers sent a letter to the PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif requesting a review of the decision. As a mark of protest, Malik Muhabbat Awan has filed nomination papers as an independent candidate for PK-46 and NA-18, Abbottabad-II.



Muhammad Ashfaq and Sabir Tanoli, other party loyalist, have also filed their nomination papers in independent capacities. Both said they would prove their popularity as independents.

In PK-50, Haripur, the PML-N awarded a ticket to Awami National Party’s (ANP) former provincial minister Qazi Muhammad Asad, ignoring the PML-N youth wing leader Abdul Shakoor Khan and Qazi Modood-ul-Haq, a party activist in Haripur. The two held a press conference stating they would not support Asad and maintained he was likely to lose the election, destroying any hopes the party might have had of regaining the seat.

The discord in PML-N’s ranks was further increased when tickets were withdrawn from Babar Salim Khan Swati, a candidate from PK 53, Mansehra-I, and Akhtar Hussain Shah from PK 54, Mansehra-II. This so transpired because the candidates reportedly had differences with Sardar Muhammad Yousuf, a PML-N candidate for NA-20, Mansehra-I.

The decision has not only prompted the party’s district chapter to support both candidates, but also field Aslam Khan, district president of PML-N, as their consensus candidate on NA-21, Mansehra-II, against Captain (retd) Muhammad Safdar, Sharif’s own son-in-law.

In PK-48, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) faces a similar situation having awarded a ticket to Dr Adnan Bashir, one of the founding directors of the Women Medical College Abbottabad, for the second time. The PPP’s decision annoyed old workers such as Salim Shah and Sardar Zakir Hussain who decided to quit the party and announce they were joining the PPP Shaheed Bhutto faction. Salim Shah filed his papers against Dr Adnan Bashir in protest while Zakir Hussain filed his papers in NA-17, Abbottabad-I.

Although ticket awarding has been put on hold by the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leadership until April 7, news that Yousuf Ayub Khan has been chosen as a candidate from PK 50 has annoyed Khursheed Khan and other PTI local leaders. According to observers, however, Ayub, whose family lost the seat to Qazi Asad in 2002 and again in 2008, is considered to be a strong candidate this time.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 1^st, 2013.