Pakistan: Election Commission gears up for presidential polls on March 9

Pakistan, still reeling from accusations of electoral tampering following the country’s general elections, is preparing to choose a new president by March 9.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has scheduled a presidential election for March 9, two days before half of the senators will retire following their six-year tenure, according to a report in ‘The Dawn’.

“The president will be elected by the present senators after setting up of all the four provincial assemblies,” a senior Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) office-bearer told the media, adding that the election could take place on March 9 or 10.

The six-party alliance has already named Asif Ali Zardari as its unanimous choice for the nation’s top constitutional office. The alliance is expected to establish a coalition government at the Center under Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Shehbaz Sharif.

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Prior to this, Zardari held the office of president from September 2008 to September 2013, following the resignation of Pervez Musharraf, the military dictator.

“Elections to the office of President shall be held not earlier than sixty days and not later than thirty days before the expiration of the term of the president in office: Provided that, if the election cannot be held within the period aforesaid because the National Assembly is dissolved, it shall be held within thirty days of the general election to the President,” states Article 41(4) of the Constitution.

The presidential election must be place before March 9 — just two days before half of the Senate’s 100 members retire— because the general elections were held on February 8.

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Officials told the media that the Senate elections were originally scheduled for the first week of March. However, due to the postponement of the national and provincial assemblies’ general elections, the Senate elections will now take place either in the final week of March or the first week of April. This means that the upper house will continue to be dysfunctional and unfinished for a while.

A PPP leader has stated that the party has prevented its two senators, Nisar Khuhro and Jam Mahtab Dahar, from taking the oath of office as MPAs in the Sindh Assembly due to the impending presidential election and to guarantee Zardari’s victory.

A senator’s vote counts as one under the method used for the president’s election, however in the Sindh Assembly, one vote is equivalent to almost four votes.

Zardari will profit from the presidential elections in this way.

Since September 9 of last year, when his five-year term expired, incumbent President Arif Alvi has already been in office for a longer period of time.

Alvi is the fourth democratically elected president of the nation to serve out a full five-year term. Prior to Alvi, the three presidents who served out their entire tenure were Asif Ali Zardari (the eleventh president, from 2008 to 2013), Mamnoon Hussain (the twelveth president, from 2013 to 2018), and Chaudhary Fazal Elahi (the fifth president, from 1973 to 1978).

Consequently, Alvi is the first president to serve an extended term as a result of an incomplete electoral college, which consists of the National Assembly, Senate, and the four provincial assemblies. Alvi is also the third president in a row to have a full term.

The PML-N and the PPP stand to lose a significant portion of their membership when senators retire on March 11—69% and 57%, respectively, according to term-wise data.

However, following the votes on February 8, the PPP and PML-N will be able to increase their combined Senate vote totals. However, if the PTI fails to hold the intra-party elections prior to the Senate polls, it will be clearly at a disadvantage and might have to rely on the SIC to secure representation in the parliament’s upper house.

The Senate currently has 100 members, consisting of four senators from the former Fata and Islamabad and 23 members from each of the four federating divisions.

A province is allotted 23 seats, of which 14 are general seats, 4 are reserved for women, 4 are for technocrats, and 1 is for a member of a minority group.

This means that 48 new senators will be chosen in the next Senate elections: two from Islamabad, two minority members from Punjab and Sindh, and eleven each from the four provinces for the general and technocrat seats.

Due to the passing of Rana Maqbool Ahmed of the PML-N and the resignations of Anwaarul Haq Kakar of the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) and Shaukat Tarin of the PTI after assuming the role of caretaker prime minister, the house now has 97 members.

Senators serve six-year terms, however elections are held to replace their retiring members every three years.