Pakistan to hold bypolls for vacant National Assembly seats in March

Pakistan’s top election body on Friday announced that it will hold by-elections on March 16 for the 33 seats of the National Assembly that fell vacant after the resignations of lawmakers from Imran Khan's Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) officially notified the schedule, including the nomination period by the candidates and the final holding of polls.

Elections would be held in 12 constituencies of Punjab, nine in Sindh, eight in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, three in Islamabad and one in Balochistan, according to the notification issued by ECP.

The notification stated that the candidates can file their nomination papers from February 6-8 and the initial list of candidates will be published on February 9.

The nominations can be challenged and after scrutiny and other legal formalities, the final list will be published on February 23.

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The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party lawmakers had resigned en-masse from the lower house of parliament following the ouster of PTI chief Imran Khan in April last year through a no-confidence vote.

National Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf on July 28, 2022, accepted the resignations of only 11 but stopped the process.

After many weeks, the Speaker on January 17 accepted another 34 PTI resignations and followed it with 35 more on January 20.

Later, he accepted another 43 resignations on January 25 to virtually eliminate the PTI from the National Assembly.

Now the ECP has started the process of the election on the vacant seats by announcing March 16 as the date for polls on only 33 seats.

It is believed that the schedule for the other vacant seats would also be announced soon.

According to the law, elections should be held within 60 days of the seats becoming vacant on the resignation or death of any lawmaker.

However, the rule applies only if a seat in any assembly has become vacant not later than 120 days before the term of that assembly is due to expire.

If the time period is less than 120 days, then elections are held along with the general elections. Pakistan’s current National Assembly is set to complete its term on August 16.