Three-way fight in Islamabad’s NA-52

Close competition expected between PTI, PML-N and PPP candidates in NA-52

ISLAMABAD: Islamabad’s NA-52 constituency consists of the capital’s rural belt towards the south-east of the district. It starts from Chak Shehzad and goes all the way to Sihala Sihala and from Rawat on to the GT Road.

The constituency has a total of population of 700,744. But only 34 per cent of the area’s population, or around 234,508 people, are registered as voters. Over half of these, or 125,183 are men while 109,325 are women.

The area includes localities such as Tarlai, Alipur, Kuri, Pind Begwal, Tumair, Koral, Lohi Bher, Sihala, and Rawat.



Though most of the constituency comprises villages, a number of housing societies and gated communities — populated by middle and upper-middle income people —also fall in NA-52. These include Bahria Town, DHA, PWD, Korang Town, Sawan Garden, Naval Anchorage and Jinnah Garden.

Habitations along Expressway and Lehtrar Road including Ghauri Town also form a part of the constituency.

One of the reasons for the low voter-to-population ratio in the district is that most of the residents in these housing societies have not transferred their votes to the localities they live in.

There are 11 candidates in the running for this constituency but the major contestants include Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) Dr Tariq Fazal Chaudhry and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) Raja Khurram Nawaz. Others include Pakistan Peoples Party’s (PPP) Raja Afzal Khokhar.

Dr Chaudhry spent the last five years at the helm of the capital’s administrative affairs. First as a junior minister of the Capital Administration and Development Division (CADD) and towards the end of the government’s tenure as a full minister of the department.

In his nomination papers, Dr Chaudhry even listed that he “represented his people at all forums. As MNA and later as minister CADD, I worked a lot in the uplift of the infrastructure of Islamabad and uplifting the standard of education.”

Nawaz is PTI’s Islamabad regional president and had also won the Union Council chairman seat in the local government elections.

Khokhar is the brother of the former National Assembly deputy speaker Nawaz Khokhar.

Unlike the other two NA constituencies in Islamabad where the main race is between the PTI and the PML-N, Khokhar is considered a strong candidate in this constituency, thanks to the backing of the influential Khokhar clan here.

Khokhar’s nephew Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar, who is currently a PPP Senator, had bagged 44,984 votes in the constituency in the 2013 general elections. Impressive figures on their own, but they were not enough for him to get past PTI’s Ilyas Mehrban who had 57,383 votes or even Dr Chudhry who bagged a massive 94,106 votes.

PTI’s Khurram Nawaz is also considered favourite by some analysts with strong support in the local population and the clans here.

Dr Chaudhry has seen his advantage erode somewhat owing to the new delimitations and the public perception that as a minister in charge of the capital, he did little to improve the lives of rural residents of the city.

One of the biggest complaints locals have is the ban on new utility connections and dwindling water supply in many areas by the Capital Development Authority (CDA).

“Dr Chaudhry was the minister for CADD for five years but he has not done much to improve the infrastructure in Tarlai and Khanna areas,” said Ahmed, a resident of Ghauri Town.



He said the CDA had barred the Islamabad Electric Supply Company (IESCO) and the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) from approving new connections in several areas in the constituency which had created difficulties for the locals.

A local PTI leader has promised that their administration would lift the ban should they come to power after the July 25 elections.

“We have held protests and taken out rallies from the rural areas to the CDA head offices to highlight this issue,” he said.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 23^rd, 2018.