Anwarul Haq of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) ‘forward bloc’ was elected unopposed as new Prime Minister of Azad Jammu and Kashmir (AJK), with a comfortable majority of 31 votes in the 52-strong Legislative Assembly in the wee hours of Thursday.
Haq, the speaker of the AJKLA, received the support of 31 MLAs, including 12 from the forward bloc, 12 of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and seven of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
The election of the prime minister was triggered by the disqualification of Tanvir Ilyas of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) by the AJK High Court on April 11. Later, the decision was upheld by the region’s Supreme Court.
According to Article 17 of the AJK Constitution, election of the prime minister is necessary in the ongoing AJKLA session. However, because of lack of a clear majority, the session was postponed for many times.
Initially, the session was convened at 2pm Wednesday but it was delayed amid hectic political manoeuvring. Consequently, a new election schedule was issued by the speaker late in the night and the proceedings started at 12:40am Thursday.
The AJKLA comprises 52 lawmakers, out of whom the PTI has 31 members, followed by the PPP (12) and the PML-N (7). However, the ‘forward bloc’ reduced the PTI’s strength to just 19.
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