RAWALPINDI: After the announcement of a schedule for elections on the reserved seats of Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation and the District Council, the ruling PML-N is in hot water.

Due to divisions within the party, the PML-N, which won 40 out of the 46 union councils in the RMC on December 5, 2015, has not been able to finalise the names of its candidates.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has announced that the elections on the reserved seats would be held on September 1. There are 10 reserved seats for women, two each for technocrats, peasants/workers, minorities and one seat for the youth.

Differences emerge within ruling party as local leaders want their people in municipal corporation, district council

About 52 candidates are vying for the 17 seats - 10 for women, two each for technocrats, peasants/workers, minorities and one for the youth. The PML-N has fielded 22 women for the 10 seats while there are also two candidates of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP).

The returning officer faced problems in allocating symbols to the candidates who were asking for ‘Tiger’, the election symbol of the PML-N. The returning officer was of the view that the symbol would be allocated to those who would produce the party tickets.

A senior leader of the PML-N told Dawn that each of the local leaders wanted to accommodate their candidates on the reserved seats. He said sisters and other relatives of two former MPAs were among the aspirants.

He said differences emerged between women workers and the local leaders when the former asked for accommodation on the reserved seats due to their long association with the party.

He said there were three candidates for the post of the mayor and all of them wanted to accommodate their respective supporters on the reserved seats so they would help them in getting votes in the secret balloting for the election of the mayor.

“The situation would deteriorate in coming days as the local leaders have started approaching the central leaders to accommodate their people on the reserved seats. The union council chairmen are also making campaigns for their group members.”

He said the issue was taken up at a meeting of the PML-N on August 12 but the local leaders stopped the participants from speaking on it as they were busy in making arrangements for the August 13 public gathering.

He said for the last about eight months the ruling party had been delaying the elections to avoid divisions within the party despite the fact that it had won a majority of seats.

A union council chairman of the PML-N requesting not to be named told Dawn that the 40 union council chairmen would select the 17 members on the reserved seats but they had not been consulted for accommodating the party workers.

“The names of former MPA Ziaullah Shah’s sister for woman seat, MPA Raja Hanif Advocate’s brother for technocrat seat and Sardar Naseem’s son for youth seat have been finalised without taking the chairmen of union councils on board.”

Former MNA Malik Shakil Awan admitted that there were resentments among the party workers as well as local leaders regarding the selection of candidates.

However, PML-N city president Sardar Naseem said there was no division in the party on the reserved seat elections, adding a list of the candidates would be issued soon.

He admitted that there were more than 22 PML-N women aspirants for the 10 reserved seats. He said the party would finalise the names and hand over the list to the union council chairmen before the polling day.

He said the elections would be held on secret balloting and the union council chairmen had already been asked to follow the instructions of the PML-N as the local government elections were held under the party basis.

“Any union council chairman violating the party’s instructions regarding the candidates for the reserved seats and the mayor will lose his seat,” he added.

Published in Dawn, August 17th, 2016