Clouds of uncertainty loom over the first-ever provincial assembly elections in the erstwhile Federally Administered Tribal Areas despite continuation of the election process by the Election Commission of Pakistan. While the National Assembly passed the Constitution (Twenty-Sixth Amendment) Bill, 2019, on May 13 for increasing the existing number of seats allocated to former Fata in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, the bill has yet to be passed by the Senate.

The ECP had issued a notification on May 6 announcing schedule for the provincial assembly elections in former Fata under which polling should be held on July 2. Presently, the election process is in progress for filling 21 seats in the merged tribal districts, including 16 general seats, four seats reserved for women and a single seat reserved for non-Muslims.

In case the constitutional amendment bill is passed by the Senate the ECP will be bound to call off the election process so as to make arrangements for polls in accordance with the increased number of seats.

The Senate session was prorogued by the President on May 13 and it is no longer in session. In case the Senate session is not convened and the bill is not passed by it, the present constitutional provisions related to former Fata will remain intact and polling will be held as per schedule.

Prior to the enactment of Constitution (Twenty-Fifth Amendment) Act, 2018, in May last year, the former Fata was having 12 seats in the National Assembly. With the passage of the said amendment the erstwhile Fata was merged with Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Article 247 of the Constitution, through which Fata and Pata were having different status from rest of the country, was omitted.

Amendments were also made in Article 51 of the Constitution to change the number of seats allocated to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the light of merger of tribal districts. Previously, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was having 48 National Assembly seats, including 39 general seats and nine reserved for women.

Following the last year’s amendments, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is now having 55 seats, including 45 general and 10 reserved for women, in the National Assembly. Thus the 12 seats of former Fata were reduced to only six general seats. However, that provision was not applicable to the 2018 general elections and shall be applied to next elections.

Similarly, amendments were made in Article 106 dealing with the allocation of provincial assembly seats to each of the province. For the first time seats were allocated to the erstwhile Fata in KP Assembly.

Before the Constitution (Twenty-Fifth Amendment) Act the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly was having 124 seats, including 99 general, 22 reserved for women and three for non-Muslims. After the amendments, the number of seats was increased to 145, including 21 seats for the erstwhile Fata.

In the Constitution (Twenty-Sixth Amendment) Bill, 2019, which was presented by independent MNA Mohsin Dawar, it is proposed to increase the number of National Assembly seats in former Fata to 12.

Similarly, it is proposed to increase the KP Assembly seats to 155, including 31 allocated to Fata. These 31 seats include 24 general, six reserved for women and one for non-Muslims.

In the 25th Amendment it was mentioned that elections to fill the provincial assembly seats allocated to ex-Fata shall be held within a year after the 2018 general elections. Now in the 26th Amendment Bill it is given that elections to fill the provincial assembly seats in former Fata shall be held within 18 months after the 2018 general elections.

“While the Election Commission of Pakistan had announced the schedule people were initially very enthusiastic, but after the passage of the Constitution amendment bill by the National Assembly the response of people was lackluster,” said Anwarullah Khan, a senior journalist of Bajaur tribal district. He said that there was still no clarity about the fate of the Constitution (Twenty-Sixth Amendment) Bill and people, including the candidates, were in a fix about whether the scheduled polls would be held on July 2 or not.

It was on Jan 2, 2019, when the ECP had issued a notification announcing the number of seats allocated to each of the merged tribal districts. These seats were allocated on the basis of provisional results of the 2017 Population Census. According to that notification, three seats each were allocated to Bajaur and Khyber tribal districts, two seats each to Mohmand, Kurram, North Waziristan and South Waziristan districts, and one seat each to Orakzai tribal district and six former frontier regions.

Subsequently, the ECP on March 4, 2019, through a notification notified the final list of delimitation of constituencies.

In case of passage of the Constitution (Twenty-Sixth Amendment) Bill by the Senate, the ECP has to carry out fresh delimitation of constituencies under the Elections Act, 2017 as the general seats will increase from 16 to 24.

Under section 21 of the Elections Act, for the purpose of delimiting constituencies the ECP may receive and consider representations, hold inquiries, summon witnesses and record evidence, and shall prepare and publish in the official Gazette a preliminary report and list of constituencies specifying the areas proposed to be included in each constituency.

Furthermore, the ECP shall invite representations in respect of the preliminary report within a period of 30 days and after hearing the representations, the ECP shall make such amendments, alterations or modifications in the preliminary list of constituencies as it thinks fit or necessary. The ECP shall publish the final report within 30 days from the last date fixed for making representation.

In the ongoing election process a total of 476 nomination papers were filed of which 51 were rejected during scrutiny, which completed on May 18. Election appellate tribunals have been hearing appeals filed against rejection of nomination papers and that process would conclude on Monday (today).

Published in Dawn, May 27th, 2019