News
Tuesday, May 28, 2013
PTI won second most votes in elections* Party polled 7.7m votes to win 28 NA seats; PPP took 32 seats with only 6.9m ballots
* 19 political parties didn’t get a single vote
ISLAMABAD: Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) won the second largest number of votes in the general election, data released on Monday showed, despite finishing third in terms of seats.
PTI polled 7.7 million votes in the May 11 election to win 28 National Assembly seats, but the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) which led the outgoing government took 32 seats with only 6.9 million ballots. Turnout at the election, which marked the first time a civilian government had completed a five-year term and handed over power at the ballot box, was 55 percent, the Election Commission of Pakistan said – up from 44 percent in the 2008 poll.
In total, 46.2 million people voted compared with 36.6 million five years ago, despite Taliban threats to attack polling stations on election day. Both PTI and PPP were well behind the Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) led by two-time prime minister Nawaz Sharif, which took 126 seats and 14.9 million votes, according to the commission. PML-N officials say they have persuaded 18 independent lawmakers to join the party, taking them comfortably beyond the 136 seats they need to be sure of a majority in the Lower House.
In the National Assembly, 272 seats are elected directly. A further 70 seats reserved for women and minorities are distributed to parties according to the proportion of general seats they win. Caretaker Prime Minister Mir Hazar Khan Khoso has sent a note to President Asif Ali Zardari asking him to convene the National Assembly on Saturday for the swearing-in of new lawmakers, the PM’s Press Secretary Shafqat Jalil told AFP. The House is expected to choose a speaker and deputy on June 3 and on June 5 it will formally elect the prime minister – Nawaz Sharif, who will begin an unprecedented third term in office. Results are still awaited from seven seats where polling was delayed due to violence or where recounts were ordered after allegations of irregularities.
According to the details released by the ECP of votes polled, nineteen political parties could not get a single vote for the National Assembly seats, while another eighteen political parties were unable to score even a hundred votes. The ECP said that the political parties which got the maximum votes are the PML-N, PTI, PPP, MQM and the JUI-F. The Qaumi Watan Party (QWP), the Mazdoor Kisan Party (MKP), the Pakistan Green Party (PGP) and the Pasmanda Awami Tehreek (PAT) could not get a single vote in the polls. The Tehreek-e-Masawaat of Musarrat Shaheen got only 99 votes. agencies
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk