ISLAMABAD: Governor of Pakistan’s northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Hajji Ghulam Ali, on Wednesday acted on the chief minister’s advice by issuing a notification to dissolve the provincial assembly of the province “with immediate effect.” 

The move is a tactic by former prime minister Imran Khan to force the government of PM Shehbaz Sharif to conduct snap polls across the country. KP Chief Minister Mahmood Khan advised the provincial governor to dissolve the local assembly late on Tuesday, according to a notification seen by Arab News.

Last week, Khan’s ally in Punjab, the country’s most populous province, also dissolved the legislative assembly there.

A letter from KP CM Mahmood Khan to the governor said he was forwarding his “advice for dissolution of Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on 17th January, 2023 at 2100 hours.” Legal experts said Ali had 48 hours to abide by the CM’s advice or else the assembly will be considered legally void, unless the dissolution order is contested in court.

“NOW, THEREFORE, I, HAJI GHULAM ALI, Governor of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, under Clause (1) of Article 112 of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, dissolve the Provincial Assembly of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, with immediate effect,” the notification from the governor read. 

“Henceforth, the Provincial Cabinet also stands dissolved,” it added. 

The notification further said that as per the constitution’s Article 224-A, Khan shall continue to hold the office of the chief minister to perform the day-to-day affairs of the province till the appointment of the care-taker chief minister.

It said that as per the constitution, the governor shall appoint a caretaker chief minister after consultations with the chief minister and the leader of the opposition in the outgoing provincial assembly within three days. 

The dissolution of the assemblies in the two provinces ruled by Khan’s party has created a crisis for the coalition government of PM Sharif.

Pakistan is due to hold general elections later this year, but Khan has been calling for early elections since he was ousted from office last April in a parliamentary vote of no-confidence.

Holding elections in both provinces, in addition to general elections, will be an expensive and logistically complicated exercise for a government heavily dependent on foreign aid after devastating floods last year.

Political analysts say the new pressure created by the dissolution of the two assemblies will bolster Khan’s demands, although any local assembly elections do not constitutionally trigger a national election.

In a surprise move, the National Assembly Speaker, a close Sharif ally, on Tuesday accepted long pending resignations of 35 PTI lawmakers, after which the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) de-notified them.
Khan’s party decided to quit the National Assembly en masse after he was driven out of power last April but the Speaker, Raja Parvez Ashraf, said he needed to individually verify if the lawmakers were resigning on their own accord.

The acceptance of the since pending resignations means the PTI will be challenged in terms of numbers if it asks Sharif to seek a trust vote from parliament.