Papers of over 50 Senate aspirants approved

LAHORE/PESHAWAR:

The provincial election commissioners of Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) accepted the nomination papers of more than 50 candidates for the 32 Senate seats in the two provinces to be contested on April 2.

Punjab Election Commissioner Aijaz Anwar Chohan, accepted the nomination papers of 21 candidates for 12 Senate seats from the province – seven general, two reserved for women, two for technocrats, and one reserved for non-Muslims, after scrutiny.

In all, 28 candidates had filed the nomination papers with the provincial election commissioner, who is serving as the returning officer for the Senate Election. As per a lists issued by the provincial election commissioner, the papers of seven candidates were rejected.

Now, for the seven general seats, the candidates into the fray are: Walid Iqbal, Shahzad Waseem, Talal Badar, Ejaz Minhas, Mohsin Naqvi, Ahad Cheema, Pervaiz Rashid, Nasir Mehmood, Hamid Khan, Raja Nasir Abbas, Musadik Malik and Omar Sarfraz Cheema.

For two technocrat seats, Muhammad Aurangzeb, Mustafa Ramday, Yasmin Rashid, and Musadik Malik are in the contest. Faiza Ahmad, Anusha Rehman Ahmad Khan, and Bushra Anjum Butt are allowed to contest for the two women’s seats. Asif Ashiq and Khalil Tahir to vie of the moniriteis seat.

The nomination papers of Mian Najeebuddin Awaisi, Irfan Ahmad Khan Daha, Sayed Zulifkar Abbas Bukhari, and Khawaja Habibur Rehman were rejected for general seats. The papers of Surriya Naseem and Sanam Javed were rejected for women’s seats and of Tariq Javed for the minorities seat.

The K-P election commissioner declared the nomination papers of 30 candidates as valid for 11 seats – eight for technocrats seats, six for women seats and 18 for general seats, according to the list issued by the returning officer of the election.

The candidates, whose papers were approved are: Syed Arshad Hussain, Qazi Anwar, Waqar Qazi, Khalid Masood, Fazal Hanan, Dilawar Khan, Qalzar Khan, Noorul Haq Qadri, Irfan Saleem, Dilawar Khan, Mirza Afridi, Faisal Javed, Talha Mehmood, Azhar Mashwani, Niaz Ahmed, Waqas Orkazai, Fazal Hanan, Faizur Rehman, Attaul Haq, Fida Muhammad, Shafqat Ayaz, Asif Rafiq, Taj Mohammad Afridi and Noorul Haq Qadri, Mehvish Ali Khan, Ayesha Bano, Rubina Naaz, Begum Tahira Bukhari, Rubina Khalid, and Shazia.

Polling for the Senate seats will be held on April 2 in the respective provincial assemblies. According to the schedule, the last date for filing appeals against the decisions of the RO about acceptance/rejection of nomination papers would be March 21 (today).