PESHAWAR, July 30: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s candidate retired Justice Wajihuddin Ahmed polled more ballots than PML-N’s nominee Mamnoon Hussain in voting for presidential election in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on Tuesday.

Justice Ahmed got 69 votes against Mr Hussain’s 41. Of the 120 members of the assembly, 110 lawmakers cast their votes. Four MPAs each of the PPP and the Awami National Party boycotted the election.

Romana Jalil of Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) and Minister for Environment Ibrar Hussain of the Qaumi Watan Party (QWP) could not cast their votes because they are in Saudi Arabia to perform Umra.

Names of the absent MPAs were announced in the hall before the counting of votes.

Peshawar High Court Chief Justice Dost Mohammad Khan was the presiding officer for the election.

Tight security arrangements were made for the polling in the assembly building. However, the media personnel were allowed to cover the polling.

Polling started at 10am and 110 members polled their votes by 2pm.

While announcing the result, Justice Dost Mohammad said that all the 110 votes cast had been declared valid.

The PTI candidate was supported by Jamaat-i-Islami, Awami Jamhuri Ittehad Pakistan, All Pakistan Muslim League of Gen Pervez Musharraf and an independent MPA Javid Akbar. APML has only one member in the house.

The JUI-F and QWP voted for the PML-N candidate. The QWP despite being a coalition partner of PTI in the provincial government voted against its candidate.