SWABI, March 2: The newly-elected provincial president of Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf, Asad Qaisar, has said that they expect to receive about 2,000 applications from the party members for 35 general seats of the National Assembly and 99 general seats of provincial assembly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

“We are planning to contest the coming election from all the NA and PA constituencies in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The difficult phase of intra-party election is over and now we will focus on the campaign for general election,” Mr Qaisar said while talking to Dawn here on Saturday.

He urged the party workers to accelerate the election campaign and educate people on the PTI manifesto. Answering a question, he said that all their internal differences had ended with the conclusion of intra-party election and that his rivals had also accepted the results.

“However, if someone still has complaints we would constitute committees to address them through amicable means,” he said.

Answering another question, he said that they would like to enter into an electoral alliance with like-minded parties, especially those from the opposition except Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz who played the role of friendly opposition. He alleged that the PML-N was equally responsible for difficulties the people suffered during the PPP-led government.

The PTI KP president said that they were in favour of seat-to-seat adjustment with the link-mind parties so as to block the way of corrupt politicians planning to return the assemblies.

Mr Qaisar, who belongs to Swabi district, said that he had planned to contest election on one seat each of national and provincial assemblies.

“I will contest the upcoming elections from NA-13, Swabi-II and PK-35, Swabi-V. In my own constituencies I would kick off the election campaign very soon,” he said.

He said that party tickets would be awarded on merit and the next general election was very critical for them. “Merit would be the criteria for award of the PTI ticket,” he said.

He said that once the applications were received on the provincial level, these would be sent to the election committee at centre, which would make a decision about the award of ticket.

Of the total 124 seats of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly 99 are general, 22 reserved for women and three for the minorities. Similarly, of the total 43 National Assembly seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 35 are general and eight reserved for women parliamentarians.