announcement<\/a> of a rough timeline for the general elections has drawn a mixed response from political parties, with some approving and others, who are not satisfied by the general timeframe, asking for a more specific date.<\/p>\nWhile two mainstream parties, the PML-N and PPP, have welcomed the announcement, the Awami National Party (ANP) has called for a precise date, and the PTI has vowed to challenge the move in court.<\/p>\n
PTI\u2019s core committee member Niazullah Niazi mentioned that the constitution calls for elections within 90 days, and exceeding this timeframe is against the law.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe plan to challenge the Election Commission\u2019s decision. The way the ECP is operating doesn\u2019t seem in line with constitutional principles,\u201d Mr Niazi told Geo News<\/em>.<\/p>\n\nANP calls for \u2018specific date\u2019, PML-N urges all forces to commence preparations<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Separately, in a statement, a party spokesperson said that since the matter of holding elections within 90 days was pending before the Supreme Court, it was not possible for the nation to accept any date other than the 90-day limit until the apex court gave its final judgement in this regard.<\/p>\n
\u2018Uncertainty must end\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\nSenior PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal expressed his party\u2019s satisfaction with the commission\u2019s decision, saying it has put an end to the uncertainty surrounding the delimitation process.<\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the very beginning, everyone knew that the Election Commission had to carry out delimitation after the census,\u201d Mr Iqbal said.<\/p>\n
\u201cInitially, the ECP had indicated that the delimitation process would conclude by December 15, followed by estimated polls in February next year.<\/p>\n
\u2018Favourable\u2019 development<\/strong><\/p>\nPPP leader Qamar Zaman Kaira, in a cautious statement, mentioned that he could provide his personal viewpoint on the issue and considered the development as \u201cfavourable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Speaking to Geo News<\/em>, Mr Kaira explained that he couldn\u2019t speak on behalf of his party, which had been urging the ECP to adhere to the constitution in announcing the election schedule. The former federal minister expressed his hope that the uncertainty would now dissipate, and he looked forward to a positive progression.<\/p>\nMQM-P leader Mustafa Kamal also expressed his satisfaction with the government and the ECP for meeting their demand to conduct elections after completing a fresh delimitation process.<\/p>\n
However, he emphasised the importance of observing whether the ECP would address their party\u2019s concerns regarding constituency demarcation after releasing the initial delimitation list.<\/p>\n
\u2018Give us a date\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\nIn the meantime, the ANP has called on the commission to give a specific election date.<\/p>\n
When asked about the ECP\u2019s announcement, senior ANP leader Zahid Khan stated that their request has consistently been for elections to take place within 90 days. He noted that the party had raised this issue during their meeting with Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja.<\/p>\n
Published in Dawn, September 22th, 2023<\/em><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"KARACHI: The ECP\u2019s announcement of a rough timeline for the general elections has drawn a mixed response from political parties, with some approving and others, who are not satisfied by the general timeframe, asking for a more specific date. While two mainstream parties, the PML-N and PPP, have welcomed the announcement, the Awami National Party […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":6586,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.dawn.com\/large\/2023\/09\/22103735260d6df.png?r=103823","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6585","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-top-news"],"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pakistaninewspaperlist.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}