Live: Elections 2024

PTI’s Barrister Gohar Khan has warned that the International Monetary Fund programme would be “damaged” if the poll results were not in accordance with Form 45s.

At a media talk, he said Pakistan could not afford further political turmoil and demanded that the same could only be prevented by the announcement of “free poll results”.

PTI’s Barrister Gohar Khan has called former Rawalpindi commissioner Liaqat Ali Chattha a “whistleblower” who unveiled details about “poll rigging”.

“We demand that his life and his children’s security must be ensured so that he can take part in any inquiry,” he said.

Last week, Chattha had accused the Election Commission of Pakistan and Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa of involvement in the “rigging” — a claim denied by the electoral watchdog and the top judge.

The PTI has demanded that Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja immediately resign, saying that the CEC failed to hold elections in a free, fair and transparent manner.

“After meeting Khan sahib today, the PTI demands that the CEC resign, he has no right to stay in the position for a single day,” Barrister Gohar Khan said at a media talk outside Adiala Jail.

He demanded that all the inquiries into poll discrepancies should be impartial and without any interference. “We want the election results to be in accordance with the mandate of the public,” Gohar added.

PTI leader Barrister Gohar Ali Khan says the Election Commission of Pakistan failed to fulfil its responsibility in “every step of the way”.

At a press conference in Islamabad, he said Form 45s were the ECP’s responsibility and the returning officers were bound to announce results according to these documents.

“But under the incumbent chief election commissioner this cannot happen.”

Two independents, who clinched victory from PB-41 (Quetta) and PB-51 (Chaman), have joined the PML-N.

According to a statement issued by the party, Wali Muhammad and Abdul Khaliq met PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif and pledged their allegiance to the party.

During the meeting, Shehbaz congratulated the newly inducted members and said they had played their part in making the country stable.

Human rights activist and former senator Farhatullah Babar has sought a “deeper investigation” into the internet shutdown and demanded that the Election Commission of Pakistan explain the reasons for the same.

The Awami National Party is holding a protest against alleged poll rigging in Swabi.

In a post on X, the party said a large number of workers were participating in the protest demonstration. ANP leader Aimal Wali Khan, Sardar Hussain Babak and other leaders will address the demonstration, it added.

The Grand Democratic Alliance will stage a protest in Sindh’s Moro against alleged rigging in the Feb 8 polls. According to GDA information secretary Sardar Abdul Rahim, the protest will continue the people’s mandate is restored.

“Today’s sit-in will be of historical importance,” Rahim said. “Those plotting against the sit-in will fail.”

The sit-in will be addressed by leaders of the GDA, PTI, JUI and other parties, and future protests will also be announced today, he said. “GDA’s Jamshoro sit-in has woken up opponents from their sleep,” Rahim said.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) is hearing petitions filed by the candidates of 40 constituencies.

According to state-run Radio Pakistan, these petitions are linked to the results of the National Assembly and four provincial assembly constituencies.

The ECP has also established a designated cell for the registration of complaints at its office in Islamabad.

PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari has said that he foresees a stalemate in government formation “if someone is not ready to change their stance”.

Speaking to reporters at the Supreme Court today, the former foreign minister said the PPP and him are adamant on their stance, highlighting that it will not be changed at any cost.

“If someone else wants to change their stance, there can be progress. If they are not ready to change it, I foresee a stalemate,” Bilawal said, adding that this would not benefit democracy or the parliamentary system.

“If I want to give the PML-N a vote, I will have to give it on my terms and not theirs,” he said.

“The delay [in forming the government] is because of non-serious,” he said, adding that this harmed Pakistan’s democracy. “The faster this is resolved, it will be better for stability and the incoming government.”

PTI’s Kamran Bangash has said he still has not received a response from the Returning Officer after requesting attested copies of the Form 45.

“It has been seven days since I submitted my application to the Returning Officer PK-82, Awais Khan, requesting attested copies of Form45s immediately after he announced the manipulated consolidated results (Form 47) in absentia of all the candidates and our agents,” he wrote in a post on X.

According to Bangash, his election agent has been visiting the RO’s office daily for the past seven days to no avail.

“This situation exemplifies the disregard for the public’s mandate by a BPS-17 official Awais Khan and his DC Afaaq Wazir, who prioritise personal gains (corruption) over their duty and public vote.”

“It is clear that he was engaged in manipulating the Form 45 to favour a candidate who ranked seventh in the voting, yet a group of unscrupulous individuals declared him the winner,” he said.

Instead of giving a fresh start or the political stability that has been lacking since 2017, our badly rigged polls have hobbled our ability to tackle the huge problems that are threatening chaos. These problems include ever-rising inflation and the default threat; a surge in terrorism; and testy ties with three neighbours. They also include political polarisation and gridlock; a Constitution mauled by all major parties and institutions and thus institutional collapse. All this makes us, arguably, the most unstable and troubled state in South Asia.

A new inept PDM regime, lacking strong legitimacy, mandate, unity and ideas to tackle these challenges, may land dead on arrival. It will see internal and civilian-establishment tussles. It will face a PTI, revitalised after the post-May 9 setbacks by the polls results, with new legitimacy and energy to do what it does best — furious agitation.

Read more here.

PML-N Senator Irfan Siddiqui, while speaking in the upper house of Parliament, has said that there were no two opinions that the history of elections in the country was “not pleasant”.

At the same time, he said that if elections were controversial then that did not mean that one Form 45 was correct while another was not. “Do not imbalance the scale like this,” he said.

He said that if rigging had taken place, they had taken place across the board, not just in one province.

Talking about the 2018 polls, he said, “What was wrong then is wrong now”.

Speaking in the Senate, PTI Senator Walid Iqbal has termed the entire electoral process “tainted”. He said that the shutting down of mobile and internet services had invited criticism from the world.

He said that the caretaker government and the election commission would have to prove that there was no “malice” in this regard. Iqbal further asked about the whereabouts of the Form 45, noting that the chief election commissioner had directed to release all results till 2am on election night.

He said that the international community had also criticised the conduct of the polls.

Speaking in the Senate, Jamaat-i-Islami’s Senator Mushtaq Ahmed has called on the Election Commission of Pakistan to “apologise”, for Chief Election Commissioner Sikander Sultan Raja to resign and for proceedings under Article 6 (treason) to be initiated against him.

He also called for the formation of a judicial commission which would conduct an inquiry of all institutions.

Speaking in the Senate, Jamaat-i-Islami’s Senator Mushtaq Ahmed said that the situation was Feb 8 different, which took a “180 degree turn” the very next day.

He lauded party leader Hafiz Naeem for forfeiting the seat he won in Sindh as he had not won in the constituency. He further said that Afghans had won in the elections, lamenting that non-Pakistani nationals would be sitting in the assemblies.

He said that is why voices were clamouring that the polls “had been sold” and were pre-decided. He said that those who did rigging were “criminals” and were responsible for spreading hate in the country.

“Elections are conducted to rid countries of crisis […] But what kind of election is this which has shoved us into a new crisis? […] International institutions are saying that democracy is declining in the country,” he said.

“The bullet has kidnapped the ballot,” he said, adding that this needed to end.

Talking about the Feb 8 polls, Jamaat-i-Islami’s Senator Mushtaq Ahmed has said that mobile and internet services were shut down. “At that moment, it was evident that polls were not free, fair or transparent,” he said.

Speaking in the Senate, he said that X had been shut down on services. “Why were internet and mobile services shut down on Feb 8 polls? Why is X being restricted for three days?”

He went on to say, “Rigging has taken place. You are not facing it. You are fearful.”

He said that the shut down of X was causing educational harm and was an attack on people’s digital rights. He called for the restoration of all social media platforms.

PPP leader Faisal Karim Kundi has said that he is hopeful that talks between his party and the PML-N for the formation of the government will be finalised by today.

“I am hopeful that it will be finalised today,” Kundi said while speaking to Geo News. He added that some minor details need to be straightened out.

He reiterated that PPP would not be seeking federal ministries.

It’s time to be worried. Really worried for Pakistan.

Our political engineering formula has come undone. The hawa which was clearly blowing hard couldn’t secure a win for the blue-eyed party and engineer an election in Punjab. The ever-capricious electables have been playing up for some time now and refuse to swing around with the wind. And parties refuse to fall apart quietly after the first dozen or so among their leadership are given a software update.

And then, the people. Decades ago, it was decided they were illiterate, poor and desperate for money, and hence the political process could be reduced to ‘they sell their vote for a few thousand, let’s not blame them’, while the more organised or better off went for the promise of a naali (drain) or sadak (road). But this time around, the poor and the sadak lovers have changed their colours. Their blood has also turned white. Caste and community no longer mean the political world to them. They have turned into selfish adults who want to exercise the individual right to vote, even encouraging their mothers and sisters to think similarly. The absence of the bat didn’t confuse them, for the wily creatures used smartphones, believing it over mainstream media.

Read more here.

The knocking on its doors keeps growing louder. How long can the ECP ignore it? Over the weekend, Pakistan’s most prominent elections monitoring body as well as its top human rights watchdog have added their voices to calls for an audit of election results.

On Saturday, the same day a senior bureaucrat had ‘confessed’ to his involvement in results tampering, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan expressed its reservations regarding the “integrity and credibility” of the Feb 8 exercise, noting a range of issues that it said had “cast a shadow over the democratic process”.

A day later, the Free and Fair Election Network urged the ECP to take immediate action and address complaints regarding illegalities committed in the compilation of election results. It also proposed a three-phase process to comprehensively address the widespread allegations of rigging, which is based on an audit of each step in the results consolidation process.

In Pakistan, it is almost customary for election candidates to refuse to acknowledge their defeat. Except a few, most are generally quick to cast aspersions and question the integrity of any election which does not go in their favour.

Read the full editorial here

An antiterrorism court in Naushahro Feroze granted interim bail to National Peoples Party chairman Ghulam Murtaza Jatoi, his son, guards and workers for eight days till Feb 26 in a case of violence on election day.

Murtaza Jatoi and others were booked under relevant sections of ATA and PPC for opening fire on people and injuring three workers of PPP at Ali Buksh Machi polling station.

One of the injured Bilawal Zardari later died at Peoples Medical University Hospital, Nawabshah.

Read full story here

PPP leader Qamar Zaman Kaira has said that his party’s coalition talks with PML-N have ample time given there are still “eight to nine days” left in convening the session of the National Assembly.

Kaira said it was never a part of the agenda of the meeting that PPP would join the government in the Centre.

“So far the PPP is sticking to its stance that it will not ask the PML-N for ministries,” he said while speaking on Geo News TV show “Aaj Shahzeb Khanzada Kay Sath”.

“We sat only to streamline our mutual issues so that no deadlock will take place,” he added.

When asked if PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari is a candidate for the office of the president of Pakistan and if the PML-N will field its candidate for the same office, Mr Kaira said: “In alliances, candidates are not fielded against each other.”

A video filmed by a couple of television journalists at a printing press in Lahore — touted by the PTI as being ‘proof’ of post-poll rigging — created waves on social media, only to be debunked hours later.

The viral video, which was also shared by PTI founder Imran Khan’s official X account, appeared to show two journalists inspecting ballot papers labelled as being meant for NA-15 (Mansehra) — where PML-N chief Nawaz Sharif had contested — at a printing press in Lahore.

But as the clip circulated on social media, questions began to be raised over why ballot papers would need to be printed so long after the elections. Others asked why Rai Saqib Kharal and Imran Arshad, the reporters seen in the video, had not uploaded or shared the footage themselves.

Read more here

Some armed men attacked a police armoured vehicle on security duty at a polling station at Kot-Azam in Tank, triggering an exchange of fire that left one of the attackers dead on Monday.

The polling process had to be stopped for some time due to the ambush, though it resumed following a search and clearance operation by police.

The police vehicle was on security duty for re-polling on six polling stations at the National Assembly (NA-43) constituency of Tank-cum-Dera Ismail Khan.

On Feb 8, the polling did not take place at the six polling stations, including one at Kot-Azam in Tank and five in Kalachi tehsil of D.I. Khan, due to deteriorating law and order situation.

Read more here