Ruling coalition sweeps Senate elections

ISLAMABAD: The ruling alliance swept the Senate elections on Tuesday as the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) secured 11 and six seats respectively out of total 19 seats which were up for grabs.

The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and an independent candidate, Faisal Vawda, secured one seat each. The polling for the 19 vacant seats was held in the National Assembly as well as Punjab and Sindh assemblies. The elections on 11 Khyber Pakhtunkhwa assembly’s seats were postponed by the Election Commission of Pakistan over the “denial” of oath-taking to the lawmakers elected on reserved seats.

Overall 356 lawmakers cast their votes in the upper house of parliament’s elections, whereas the votes of five NA lawmakers were rejected. The PPP managed to win 10 Senate seats from the province, whereas the MQM-P and an independent candidate bagged one seat each.

On the general seat, Ashraf Ali Jatoi, Dost Ali Jessar, Kazim Ali Shah, Masroor Ahsan, and Nadeem Bhutto have been declared winners, as per preliminary results.MQM-P’s Amir Chishti has been elected senator on a general seat while independent candidate Faisal Vawda also won the general seat in the Senate.

PPP leaders Rubina Saadat Qaimkhani and Quratulain Marri were elected on women’s seat while another PPP candidate Punjho Mil Bhail won a reserved seat for minority.PPP’s Sarmad Ali and Zamir Ghumro won technocrat seats. In Sindh Assembly, the provincial election commissioner Sharif Ullah announced the results of the Senate polls.

In Punjab, Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb clinched victory on technocrat seat after securing 128 votes. PML-N leader and Federal Minister for Energy Musadik Malik also won a technocrat seat after securing 121 votes.

PML-N’s Anusha Rahman and Bushra Anjum Butt have been declared winners on women’s seats, while PML-N’s Tahir Khalil Sindhu has been elected on a minority seat.

In the federal capital, the ruling alliance candidates won two seats. PML-N leader and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar clinched the technocrat seat, while PPP candidate Mahmood ul Hassan won general seat.

Earlier, lawmakers in all three legislatures were given time to cast their vote from 9am till 4pm. Interestingly, the polls were scheduled to be held in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly but they were postponed by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) after the opposition members filed a plea seeking postponement due to a stand-off with the provincial government over oath-taking of MPAs-elect on the reserved seats.

The polling was not held in the Balochistan Assembly as all the 11 candidates on the vacant seats were elected unopposed.

The polling was scheduled to be conducted to elect 48 senators, initially, 11 each from KP and Balochistan, 12 each from Punjab and Sindh and two from Islamabad. However, after the unopposed election of 18 senators from Punjab and Balochistan and the postponement of polls in the KP, the elections were held for 19 vacant seats.In its notification, the ECP stated that polls for the Senate seats of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa will not be held until the administration of oath to the elected members against the reserved seats.