RAWALPINDI: Local politicians who joined Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) in the hopes of breaking into the political mainstream from its platform are now regretting their decision after being denied tickets for the upcoming cantonment board elections.

The dejected candidates claimed that PTI’s local leadership has reneged on their promise to field them as candidates in the elections and that they had been forced to withdraw their nomination papers in favour of other candidates.

Last month, local PTI leaders had managed to bring three heavyweights into their party fold; former PPP city secretary general Babu Adrees, former PML-N Rawalpindi Cantonment Board member Chaudhry Yousaf and the former PML-Q candidate from PP-10 Malik Mehboob.

According to them, the party promised to accommodate them in its team that would contest the elections.

However, the PTI parliamentary committee refused to award them tickets for any of the 20 wards of the Rawalpindi and Chaklala cantonment boards, where elections will be held for the first time in decades, on April 25.

A senior PTI leader told Dawn that the party planned to hold a meeting at Pirwadhai Mor on April 6 to introduce these three leaders to party workers and supporters, but the parliamentary committee’s decision forced the party to postpone the meeting, because the new entrants were not awarded tickets.

He said currently, the local PTI chapter was divided into two groups; the Ghulam Sarwar Khan group and the local MPAs, including Arif Abbasi and Asif Mehmood. The latter, the leader said, were on the committee that awarded the tickets and handed them to old party workers instead of the newcomers that Ghulam Sarwar Khan had coaxed into the party fold.

Of the three disgruntled men, Chaudhry Yousaf and Malik Mehboob submitted their nomination papers but then withdrew them on Friday.

However, Babu Adrees has decided to contest the elections as an independent candidate from Ward No. 6 of the Chaklala Cantonment Board.

Political observers say this may hurt the young party, which could suffer at the hands of the slighted heavyweights who command a sizeable vote bank.

In the 1998 cantonment elections, Babu Adrees managed to give the PML-N – which was in power then – quite a tough time by managing to get three of his candidates seats on the cantonment board.

Malik Mehboob, who contested the 2013 elections from PP-10 on a PML-Q ticket, had managed to secure more than 12,000 votes. In the 2008 general elections, he was the runner-up behind the PML-N’s Malik Iftikhar who got 17,000 votes against Mehboob’s 13,000.

Chaudhry Yousaf, who became a member of the Rawalpindi Cantonment Board (RCB) in 1983, has quite a sizeable support in Ward 10 thanks to familial connections.

When contacted, Babu Adrees told Dawn that he had left the PPP after serving it for 37 years because “the leadership did not try to solve the problems of its workers”.

“But, PTI is no different. There is no discipline; nobody is listening to the other’s point of view. This immaturity can be witnessed in the party’s decision to award tickets,” he said, vowing to demonstrate his political clout by contesting the elections as an independent.

Malik Mehboob told Dawn that the PTI’s local chapter had taken the decision to award tickets without consulting “their elders” and that the “under-19” team was running the affairs.

“We’ve parted way with the PML-Q and now there is no going back,” he said.

Chaudhry Yousaf told Dawn that after joining PTI, he had faced problems with the leadership, which culminated in him being denied the ticket.

PTI MPA Arif Abbasi told Dawn that the parliamentary committee had decided to promote old party workers instead of newcomers.

“We want to groom fresh faces because the party has been campaigning against traditional politicians and has promised corruption-free candidates. Some of these ‘seasoned politicians’ had a bad repute in their areas and we refused to give them party tickets,” he said.

Published in Dawn, April 11th, 2015

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