ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Friday announced a schedule for the presidential election on March 9, months after the end of Arif Alvi’s term as the 13th president of Pakistan.

Nominations for the post can be filed until Saturday with presiding officers in Islamabad and provincial capitals of Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta, according to the ECP.

A returning officer, appointed by the ECP, will scrutinize the nomination papers by March 4 and candidates can withdraw their nominations by March 5.

“In pursuance of the provisions... public notification for election to the office of the President of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan is hereby issued,” read an ECP notification issued on Friday.

In Pakistan, a president is elected by members of an electoral college, which comprises both upper and lower houses of parliament as well as provincial assemblies. Polling to elect the new president will be held on March 9.

An alliance of major political parties, including three-time former prime minister Nawaz Sharif-led Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and ex-foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari’s Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), has nominated Asif Ali Zardari as its candidate for presidency. Zardari has previously served as the president of Pakistan from 2008 till 2013.

President Alvi’s five-year term ended in September last year, but in Pakistan, a president may continue to stay in office constitutionally until his successor is elected to the presidency.

The tenure of Alvi, who took oath on Sept. 9, 2018 after former PM Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party came to power in election held the same year, was marked by political instability and civil-military tensions, and saw the ouster of Khan in a parliamentary no-trust vote in April 2022, followed by the departure of PM Shehbaz Sharif’s coalition government in August.

Besides political instability, an economic crisis gripped Pakistan during this period, with the South Asian country barely averting a default in June last year by securing a $3 billion bailout deal from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).