Following a shock defeat in the elections for the Senate top slots, PDM leaders Nawaz Sharif, Asif Zardari and Maulana Fazlur Rehman on Saturday teleconferenced to review the election and agreed to investigate all Opposition senators suspected to be ‘close’ to elected Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani.
The three leaders spoke over the telephone to discuss the PDM’s loss in the elections for Senate chairman and deputy chairman despite holding superior numbers (51 senators compared to opposition’s 47).
Sources say the three leaders have agreed to find out the reasons behind their loss in the elections.
“In chairman Senate elections, [7] votes were rejected [then] how did the government candidate get all the [7] votes in the election of deputy chairman?” Fazl reportedly asked Zardari and Nawaz during the conversation.
They also discussed preparations for the PDM’s upcoming long march and the alliance’s future.
During the conversation, the PDM chief, Fazl, also reportedly told the leaders of the two largest opposition parties that there was “no point” in holding a long march without the Opposition resigning en masse from the assemblies.
Emergency meeting on Monday
The PDM on Saturday also announced an emergency all-party conference on Monday to review the Senate debacle. All parties have been directed to send their leaders to the conference.
The leaders will discuss the prevailing political situation and present a report on behalf of their party regarding the defeat.
They will also take the senior leadership into confidence on why 7 votes were rejected in polling for the Senate chairman position.
They will also address the concerns raised by the JUI-F over the defeat of its candidate for the deputy chairman slot.
Modalities for the March 26 long march will also be given a final shape in the meeting.
Seven votes wasted
The hotly-contested Senate chairman and deputy chairman elections concluded Friday evening, with government-backed candidates Sadiq Sanjrani and Mirza Mohammad Afridi emerging as victors in the secret polls.
In the race for chairman, Sanjrani defeated Opposition candidate Yousaf Raza Gillani with 48 votes, while Gillani received 42 votes. A controversy arose over 7 votes that were deemed rejected as the stamp had been placed on Gillani’s name instead of in the blank space in front of it. The Opposition argued that the votes should be deemed valid, but the government candidates objected. The presiding officer eventually ruled that the votes would not be considered.
Senator Syed Muzafar Hussain Shah of the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional, who served as the presiding officer of the chairman’s election, administered the chairman’s oath to Sanjrani.
In the subsequent election for Senate deputy chairman, government candidate Afridi won the election with 54 votes, defeating the Opposition’s Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, who managed only 44 votes. The government candidate managed to receive 7 more votes than the government alliance’s combined strength in the Senate (47). No votes were rejected in this round of voting.
Stamps were knowingly marked on name
Sources within the Opposition told Geo News on Saturday that the seven senators who had voted by placing their stamp on Gillani’s name had done so on purpose.
They claimed that the PDM had been suspicious of the intent of seven senators and feared that they may not vote for Gilani in the election, held through secret ballot.
They added that those senators were asked by the PDM leaders to place their stamp on the PPP candidate’s name to prove that they had voted for Gilani.
Separately, Special Assistant to Prime Minister (SAPM) Shahbaz Gill reacted to the developments on Friday by casting doubt on the PML-N’s internal cohesion.
He claimed that the PDM’s long march would be a competition between its two young leaders-in-waiting, Maryam Nawaz and Hamza Shahbaz.
Gill said Maryam was the “biggest loser” in the scenario that the courts had granted Hamza Shahbaz bail in NAB cases.
The SAPM wondered who among the two will become eventual chief of the PML-N, suggesting that the competition was tilted towards Hamza as Maryam had faced multiple defeats.
Long March looms ahead
Earlier this month, PDM chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman had shared a tentative plan for the alliance’s upcoming long march, saying that caravans will arrive in Islamabad by March 30.
“The long march will begin from March 26. Caravans from every corner of the country will participate,” he said. “We appeal to the entire nation to play their part in ousting this illegal and unconstitutional government,” the JUI-F chief had said.
Fazl had said that another meeting of the Opposition’s leadership will be held on March 15 to discuss the protesters’ stay in the capital.
The PDM has decided to march on Islamabad till the the PTI-led regime resigns.