PESHAWAR/QUETTA: Newly elected lawmakers in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan provinces were sworn in on Wednesday after the inaugural session of the legislative assemblies were held in the provincial capitals of Peshawar and Quetta amid ruckus, protests.
Local media footage showed some elected legislators in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa could not enter the assembly hall on time since former prime minister Imran Khan’s party workers had clogged the area in celebration of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) election performance.
Independent candidates backed by Khan’s PTI party swept the provincial elections in KP by securing more than 90 seats and are expected to form a government for a third consecutive term.
The election in the province was held on 111 general seats after the contest was postponed in two constituencies due to the death of two candidates in them. Khan has already nominated Ali Amin Gandapur to be his party’s candidate to be the province’s new chief minister.
“PTI’s nominated Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur reached Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly and welcomed all the members and workers by holding the photo of Imran Khan,” the party said in a social media post while sharing the footage.
Khan has been in prison since last August after being convicted on charges of corruption and divulging state secrets. Speaker of the outgoing KP assembly Mushtaq Ghani administered the oath to the newly elected lawmakers. The assembly session will be followed by protests by Awami National Party (ANP) that only managed to secure one seat in the house and has leveled rigging allegations.
In Quetta, the capital of Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province, 57 newly elected members took oath during Wednesday’s session. Five important members of the assembly, including former interior minister Sarfraz Bugti, ex-Balochistan chief minister Jam Kamal Khan and former Senate chairman Sadiq Sanjrani did not come to the assembly to take oath.
Veteran parliamentarian Engineer Zamrak Khan Achakzai administered oath to the new members as former speaker Jan Muhammad Jamali was absent.
“Voting to elect the speaker and deputy speaker of the house will be held on Feb. 29, 2024, and all members will use their secret ballot of voting for the custodian of the house,” Achakzai said after the swearing-in had taken place.
Pakistan’s election regulator has so far not announced the final results of three provincial constituencies, PB-21 Hub, PB-07 Ziarat and PB-14 Naseerabad.
In Balochistan, the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) succeeded in securing a majority of seats in the provincial house of 65 members. Both are engaged in talks to form the next coalition government in Pakistan’s largest province by land, which has been wracked by a low-lying insurgency for the past two decades.
Meanwhile, dozens of protesters from Baloch nationalist parties such as the Hazara Democratic Party, the Awami National Party and the Pashtoonkhwa National Awami Party protested outside the assembly against alleged rigging in the Feb. 8 polls, calling the new assembly “illegitimate.”
“We do not accept this assembly as a legitimate forum and the proceedings of this assembly won’t be considered legitimate,” Asmat Yari, a central council member of the Hazara Democratic Party, told Arab News.
“We have been protesting for the last 20 days and will continue our struggle against election’s mandate theft.”
