First phase of general election concludes today

Several top politicians among thousands of intending candidates entering the polls fray

ISLAMABAD:

The first phase of the general elections will conclude on Sunday (today), the last day of filing nomination papers by the candidates to contest on the 266 general and 70 reserved seats of the National Assembly and more than 600 seats in all the four provincial assembly.

The process of filing of nominations was supposed to complete on Friday, but the Election Commission of Pakistan extended the three-day time period to five days on the request of the various political parties, including the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).

Saturday was the fourth day and thousands more papers were filed by the candidates from all the political parties, including Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P), Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F), Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and others.

Read Candidates continue to file nominations

The prominent politicians who filed papers on Saturday included PTI founder Imran Khan for NA-122 in Lahore; PML-N Chief Organiser Maryam Nawaz for NA-119 and NA-120, Lahore; Akhtar Mengal of the Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) for NA-264, Quetta; Jamat-e-Islami (JI) Karachi Ameer Hafiz Naeemur Rehman for NA-246 and NA-250, Karachi; former opposition leader Raja Riaz for NA-104 Faisalabad, and several others.

Imran Khan had also filed the nomination papers from his hometown constituency in Mianwali. However, he received a setback earlier this week, when the Islamabad High Court (IHC) turned down his petition for suspending his conviction in the Toshakhana case.

Now, the PTI founder and former prime minister, who is currently lodged in the Adiala Jail in Rawalpindi, looked to the Supreme Court to becoming eligible to contest the elections, as he challenged the IHC decision in the Supreme Court.

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Imran petitioned to the Supreme Court to suspend his conviction in the Toshakhana case until the final decision of his appeal pending in the IHC. However, the Registrar’s Office raised objection that the documents attached with the appeal were incomplete. The plea could now be re-filed by January 6.

So far, 148 nominations had been filed for three National Assembly seats from Islamabad. The candidates include PTI’s Shoaib Shaheen for all the three constituencies, Aamir Mughal for two seats Mustafin Kazmi and Aamir Shaikh for one seat each. From the PML-N, Zeeshan Naqvi and Rafat Chaudhry filed for NA-47 and NA-48, respectively.

Among other candidates, MQM-P’s Nadeem Mansoor submitted the nomination paper for NA-47. Similarly, nomination papers were also submitted by the candidates from the Awami National Party, (ANP), Awami Workers Party (AWP) and the JUI-F.

In Sindh, the Provincial Election Commission said that a total of 1,405 papers had been received so far from the Karachi Division --- 333 for 22 National Assembly seats and 1,072 for 47 Sindh Assembly seats.

In other parts of the province, prominent among the candidates are PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, Faryal Talpur, Nisar Khuhro, Rashid Mahmood Soomro, Dr Safdar Abbasi, Jamil Soomro, Khursheed Junejo, Moazzam Abbasi, Kazim Abbasi, Suhail Siyal, Nadir Magsi, and others.

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In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P), JUI-F chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, PPP Information Secretary Faisal Karim Kundi, Tehreek-e-Labbaik, Pakistan (TLP) local Ameer Haji Shafiq Qasuria, JI’s local leader Muhammad Yousaf and independent candidate Makhdoom Jawad Asghar submitted their papers.

Officials and political activists said that many more nomination papers would be filed on Sunday (today) – the last day for submitting the nominations for the general elections, scheduled for February 8, 2024.
From Monday (tomorrow), the ECP would kick-start the next phase of the elections with the scrutiny of the submitted papers. The scrutiny process is slated to continue till December 30, according to the revised election schedule.

In the third phase, appeals against the acceptance or rejection of the nomination papers can be submitted until January 3, 2024 with decisions expected by the 10th of January. Then the ECP will release the updated list of candidates on the 11th of January.

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The candidates will have January 12 to withdraw their nomination papers. After which date, the ECP will allocate the electoral symbols to the candidate on January 13. The voting in the general elections will take place February 8.

Meanwhile, the ECP has given more time to foreign observers, who want to monitor the general elections, to submit their applications from December 31 to January 20, an ECP official said. He said that the ECP had printed over 200,000 accreditation cards for the election coverage.

The election-24 is being held on the basis of newly-demarcated constituencies after the digital census. There are several cases pending in the courts over the new delimitation. The ECP said on Saturday it would decide about the objection to the delimitation after compiling the election results.

(WITH INPUT FROM APP)