Kaptan completes century without ‘bat’

Independent candidates continued to consolidate their lead in the General Elections 2024 over mainstream political parties, completing the century of victors in the National Assembly for the first time ever, according to the results announced by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) till Saturday.

Barring a few, independents, backed by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), have crossed the 300 mark, when the number of winners in the provincial assembly were added. They clean-swept the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province, and won a sizeable chunk in Punjab, according to the ECP Form-47 results.

The PTI could not contest the elections on Thursday because it was denied it electoral symbol of ‘bat’ due to its controversial intra-party elections. Instead, the party fielded its candidates as independent with different electoral symbols.

By Saturday, the ECP issued the Form-47 results of 255 National Assembly constituencies. Election could not be held on one National Assembly and three provincial assembly seats because of the death of the candidates. The ECP had also ordered re-polling at one National and two provincial constituencies.

The 100 PTI-backed independents are followed by 73 seats of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), 54 of the Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians (PPPP), 17 of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P), three each of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) and PML-Quaid, two of the Istehqam-e-Pakistan Party (IPP) and one each of the Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA), PML-Zia, Majlis-e-Wahdat-e-Muslimeen Pakistan (MWMP).

Provincial assemblies

According to the results, out of 295 Punjab Assembly contests, both the PTI-backed independents and the PML-N won 137 seats each; followed by the PPPP, 10; PML-Q, 7; and the Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan, IPP, and PML-Z one seat each.

In Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, the PTI-backed independents swept the election, winning 37 National Assembly seats out of 44 and 86 out of 115 provincial assembly contests. In the National Assembly contests, the PTI-backed independents are followed by two seats each of the JUI and the PML-N. One seat each went to the MWMP, the PPP and a non-PTI independent.

The independents routed opponents in Chitral, Swat, Upper Dir, Lower Dir, Malakand, Buner, Battagram, Mansehra, Abbottabad, Swabi, Mardan, Charsadda, Nowshera, Khyber, Mohmand, Kohat, Hangu, Orakzai, Karak, Bannu, Lakki Marwat, South Waziristan, Tank and districts.

Read: PTI secures two-thirds majority in NA, claims Imran

The PML-N grabbed two seats in Shangla and Mansehra districts, while the JUI-F got its two seats from Peshawar and North Waziristan district. The MWMP won in Kurram and the PPP in Dera Ismail Khan. The non-PTI independent won his seat from the Kohistan district.

In the 112 provincial assembly contests, the PTI-backed independents won 86 seats. The JUI-F follows with 7; the PML-N, 5; the PPP, 4; the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), 3; PTI-Parliamentarians, 2; Awami National Party (ANP), 1; while 4 non-PTI independents returned successful.

The four independents, who defeated the PTI-backed independents are: Malik Tariq Awan defeated Kamran Bangash in Peshawar; Fazal Haq trounced Tehmina Faheem in Kohistan Bala, Muhammad Riaz defeated Momina Basit in Kolai and Hisham Inamullah trounced Noor Salim Malik in Lakki Marwat.

In the Sindh Assembly, the PPPP secured 84 seats out of 129 contests, followed by 28 seats of the MQM-P 28, 13 of the PTI-backed independents, two each of the GDA, and the JI.

As per the 48 results from Balochistan announced so for, the PPPP secured 11 seats, followed by nine each of the PML-N and the JUI 9, and six independents. The, the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) grabbed 4 seats, ANP two seats. One seat each went to the Balochistan National Party-Awami (BNP-A), the National Party (NP), and the JI.

According to the ECP, over 128 million registered voters were scheduled to exercise their democratic right to cast votes in the elections for the national and provincial legislatures held on Thursday. The polling was held for 265 National Assembly.

Voting also took place on 590 provincial assembly seats – 51 seats of the Balochistan Assembly, 128 out of 130 seats of the K-P Assembly, 296 out of 297 seats of the Punjab Assembly, and 130 seats of the Sindh Assembly.

The ECP put on hold the results of NA-88, PS-8 and PK-90 due to certain reasons, where re-polling will be on February 15. The announcement of results were awaited for nine NA seats, one Punjab Assembly and three Balochistan Assembly seats.

According to a report of the Free and Fair Election Network (Fafen), approximately 60 million voters cast their ballots in the elections, while more than 1.1 million officials performed election duties. It added that more than 700,000 police and military officials stood guard across the country.

(WITH INPUT FROM APP)