Shumaila Rana re-election: Court issues notices

Petition challenging Rana’s re-election as a parliamentarian filed.

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court has issued notices, for May 27, to the Election Commission and PML-N MPA Shumaila Rana, who took oath on Wednesday, on a petition challenging Rana’s re-election as a parliamentarian. Adeeba Ashraf filed the petition through her counsel Malik Tariq Aziz, submitting that Rana had resigned following allegations of credit card theft. Aziz said the respondent had again become an MPA after the PML-N selected her on a seat reserved for women. The counsel argued that the election of the respondent was unconstitutional because under Article 226 of the Constitution all elections, other than that for the prime minister and the chief minister, shall be held by secret ballot. He prayed that the court direct the election commission to de-notify the respondent as MPA.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 10^th, 2012.