TIMERGARA, Feb 12: Awarding of Senate tickets to an old guard by the Pakistan People's Party and to the daughter of a slain leader by the Awami National Party can change results in the next general elections in Lower Dir, opine political analysts.

The PPP for the first time has awarded Senate ticket to Ahmad Hassan Khan, who belongs to this district. Similarly, the ANP also awarded senate ticket to Zahida Kaleem, daughter of slain leader Mohammad Sher Khan, who lost his life when a remote controlled bomb hit his vehicle in Maidan. Sher Khan was then district chairman of the zakat and ushr committee. It was the longstanding demand of the ANP workers to compensate the family as Mr Sher Khan had stood firm before militants in the area.

The ANP has already a sitting Senator Zahid Khan, who belongs to Lower Dir. Workers of the ANP, Lower Dir, also celebrated awarding senate ticket to Ms Zahida on Sunday. They said party leadership had well rewarded Mr Sher Khan's family.

Political pundits in the area are of the view that selection of two senators from the ANP and one from the PPP would weaken the dominant position of Jamaat-i-Islami in the district. The other strong party is the JUI-F thanks to efforts of its Senator Maulana Gul Naseeb. According to an analyst two senators from the ANP and one in the form of Ahmad Hassan Khan would definitely affect the result of the next general election.

The JI may lose its stronghold in Lower Dir due to two reasons, one is emergence of strong candidates of the PPP and the ANP for the upcoming general elections, and second, it is unlikely that the JI and the JUI-F would form an electoral alliance, predict political experts. According to them another factor that would negatively affect the performance of the JI is its boycott of the last general elections.

However, the JI leadership is still optimistic of winning the next general election in Dir. "It doesn't matter for us. We will clean sweep the general elections," the JI district secretary general Mohammad Rasool Khan claimed.

Mr Ahmad Hassan of the PPP has been active in national politics since long and remained deputy speaker of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa assembly during the chief ministership of Fazale Haq. He also remained provincial minister for law during the PPP-led government in the province when Aftab Ahmad Khan Sherpao was chief minister.

Ahmad Hassan Khan was elected as district nazim in 2005. Mr Hassan has been popular for his clear and selfless personality throughout the province. He was twice defeated by the Jamaat-i-Islami; once by late Dr Yaqub Khan and then Muzafar Syed in 2002.

The PPP workers and local leaders on Sunday again celebrated his selection for the upper house of parliament. They distributed sweets and took out a rally in his favour in front of the Timergara press club.

Despite opposition from some insiders in Peshawar and other parts of the province, the PPP, Lower Dir general secretary Khadim Jan said, Mr Ahmad Hassan had been a loyal worker of the party. "He was brutally beaten by police in Mardan during a long march in 1991," he told Dawn while showing some of his photographs.

He said late Benazir Bhutto was so impressed by him that she elected him as member of the PPP central executive committee. "There has been no competent and capable man as compared to Mr Hassan in the party to play active political role in the Senate," Mr Jan said, adding the party leadership had taken the right decision.