LAHORE – The ruling Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz has tracked down 28 provincial lawmakers who did not vote for the party and instead preferred to vote for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf or Pakistan Peoples Party in the recently concluded Senate elections.
The ruling party had formed two committees to identify the ‘suspects’ in its ranks who violated the party policy and voted for PTI’s Chaudhry Sarwar and PPP’s Shahzad Ali Khan in Senate polls on a general seat in Punjab. Both the candidates had bagged 14 and 18 votes respectively more than their party strength in the provincial assembly.
One of the committees had the representation of law minister Rana Sanaullah, minorities affairs minister Khalil Tahir Sindhu and adviser to the chief minister Rana Arshad, while the other comprised women legislators – Azma Bokhari, Zakia Shahnawaz, Mary Gill and Mahwish Sultana, Dawn News reported.
“We have identified 28 suspects who voted for the PPP and PTI candidates and submitted a comprehensive report to the leadership. Most of the suspects are women MPAs. Now it is up to the leadership what action it takes against them,” a PML-N insider disclosed on Thursday.
The source claimed that some of the ‘suspects’ had voted for the opposition candidates for money and others to have a ‘future understanding’, especially with the PTI.
Another credible source said the party leadership had decided not to take any action against these MPAs as PML-N government was already faced with a plenty of challenges.
“The suspected MPAs will not be considered for the party tickets on general or reserved seats in the forthcoming general election,” he said.
https://en.dailypakistan.com.pk/pakistan/ecp-likely-to-seek-fias-help-for-investigating-horse-trading-in-senate-polls/
The investigators also pinpointed an interesting aspect in the report regarding the voting pattern in the Senate polls in Punjab on seats of different categories.
On women seats, 13 votes were rejected, on minority 11 and on technocrat seats nine, while only three votes were rejected on general seats, showing that there was an intentional strategy to ‘waste’ the votes in the three categories in which the PML-N candidates could have an easy victory, said the source.
On the other hand, PTI’s sole winner from Punjab Chaudhry Sawar had claimed that the PML-N lawmakers voted for him according to their “conscience and democratic mindset”.
Moreover, PPP senior vice president Mian Manzoor Wattoo said he roped in 20 or so PML-N MPAs “mere on his connections” for his relative (Shahzad Khan).
https://en.dailypakistan.com.pk/pakistan/nawaz-sharif-constitutes-committee-to-track-deserters-who-voted-ptis-ch-sarwar-in-senate-polls/
The source claimed that while Maryam Nawaz was keen to investigate the matter, Hamza Shehbaz, the son of Chief Minister Punjab was reluctant to launch an inquiry.
Punjab’s law minister, Rana Sanaullah expressed his ignorance about the committees’ constitution and recommendations.
Taking notice of reports in the media about alleged horse-trading in the March 3 Senate elections, the ECP had summoned PTI chief Imran Khan, State Minister for Information Marriyum Aurangzeb, adviser to the prime minister Amir Muqam, leaders of two factions of the MQM-P, Dr Farooq Sattar and Khawaja Izharul Hassan, Pak Sarzameen Party’s (PSP) Raza Haroon, MNA from Fata Shahabuddin and PML-N MPA from Punjab Azma Bokhari who had issued statements questioning the fairness of the exercise.
The election regulator also hinted at seeking FIA’s help to probe into the horse-trading allegations that marred the spirit of democracy for one more time last week.
