Islamabad:
The National Assembly recovered all its force on Wednesday as the Pakistan Electoral Commission (ECP) distributed stars reserved among parliamentary parties in the Chamber, in line with the decision of the Constitutional Bank (CB) of the Supreme Court last week.
In a majority decision of 7-3 in the case of review of the reserved seats, the CB revoked on Friday the judgment of the Supreme Court of July 12, 2024, effectively eliminating the reserved seats of the national and provincial legislatures of Pakistan Tehreek-E-INF.
The CB restored the order of March 25, 2024 of the Superior Court of Peshawar (PHC), which had deprived the Sunita Ittehad Council, the party attached by independents backed by PTI after the elections of February 8, 2024, of reserved seats. The decision effectively meant that the PTI was no longer a parliamentary party.
Therefore, the 77 reserved seats of the national and provincial assemblies were assigned among the parliamentary parties present in the respective assemblies, since they could not remain vacant. As expected, the ruler League Muslim from Pakistan-Nawaz (PKL-N) was the main beneficiary.
In the light of the CB decision, the ECP distributed 19 seats reserved in the National Assembly, of which, according to an ECP statement, 13 went to the PML-N, four for the parliamentarians of the Popular Party of Pakistan (PPPP) and two to the Jamiat Ulema-E-Islam (Jui).
After the allocation of the reserved seats, the ruling coalition, which includes PML-N, PPPP, the Muttahida Qaumi-Pakistan movement (MQM-P) and other parts, exceeded the majority of two thirds of 224 in the house of 336 stretch marks.
Acting on the court verdict, the ECP issued an order on Wednesday, withdrawing its notifications of July 24 and 29, 2024 that had declared some independent candidates, winning in the general seats of the national and provincial assemblies as legislators of PTI.
In another order, the ECP notified the names of the candidates returned in several categories of the reserved seats with immediate effect. The Secretariat of the National Assembly then detailed the composition of the Chamber, which reflects the real position of the party after the court’s verdict and the distribution of the ECP.
The data published by the branch of the legislation of the Secretariat showed that the strength of the treasure banks increased to 235 seats, with 98 of the opposition, in the house currently included 333 legislators, with a suspended member and two reserved seats that were vacant.
The ECP also distributed the reserved seats in the provincial assemblies. In the KP Assembly, 10 seats were delivered to the JUI-F, seven to the PML-N, six to the PPPP and one to the PTI-PARLIAMENTARIES and the National Awami Party (ANP).
The PML-N received 23 seats at the Punjab Assembly: two for the PPPP and one for the Pakistan Muslim League Party (PML-Q) and the Itemhkam-E-Pakistan (IPP) match. In the Sindh assembly, two seats were delivered to the PPPP and one to the MQM-P.
