KARACHI: Jamaat-i-Islami’s Hafiz Naeemur Rehman and Pakistan Peoples Party’s Murtaza Wahab are among a large number of candidates who had filed their nomination papers for the election of Karachi mayor, deputy mayor, chairmen and vice chairmen of 25 town municipal corporations on Saturday.

The mayoral elections are scheduled to be held on June 15 (Thursday).

Top contenders for the office of Karachi mayor — Hafiz Naeem and Murtaza Wahab — submitted their nomination papers to the returning officer at the office of the provincial election commissioner.

Regional Election Commissioner and RO Nazar Abbas told Dawn that six candidates belonging to the JI and PPP filed nomination papers for the office of mayor Karachi, while eight aspirants of the JI, PPP, Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf filed their candidatures for the post of deputy mayor on the last day of filing nomination papers.

JI’s Advocate Saifuddin and Muhammad Junaid Mukati and PPP’s Syed Najmi Alam and Karamullah Waqasi also filed their nomination papers as covering candidates for Hafiz Naeem and Murtaza Wahab, respectively.

Advocate Saifuddin and Qazi Syed Sadruddin of the JI, Salman Abdullah Murad and Advocate Irshad Ali Shar of the PPP, Mohammad Akram Awan, Ghulam Shoaib and Mohammad Yaqoob of the PML-N and Zeeshan Zaib of the PTI filed nominations for the office of deputy mayor.

The Election Commission of Pakistan had announced that the respective electoral colleges will elect mayor, deputy mayor of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation and chairmen/vice chairmen of municipal corporations, town municipal corporations, municipal committees, town committees and district councils on June 15.

According to the schedule, scrutiny of the nomination papers will be conducted on June 11 (today). The last date for filing appeals against the decisions of the returning officers about acceptance/rejection of nomination papers is June 12 (Monday), and such appeals will be decided by the appellant authorities on June 13 (Tuesday), it added.

Published in Dawn, June 11th, 2023