PHC grants ECP 60 days to decide on Senate elections in KP

Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) signboard at its headquarters in Islamabad. — AFP/File

PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Friday gave the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) 60 days to resolve the issue of Senate elections for vacant seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

A bench comprising Justice SM Attique Shah and Justice Sahibzada Asadullah announced the verdict.

The judgement was authored by Justice Attique Shah.

According to the judgement, Senate elections in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were scheduled to take place in April 2024. However, disputes over reserved seats for women and minorities led to their postponement. Initially, some women candidates affiliated with opposition parties filed a petition claiming that the provincial assembly speaker had not administered their oaths despite their election notifications being issued.

In March 2024, the court directed that these candidates should be allowed to take oaths and cast their votes. However, the speaker did not comply with this directive, prompting the ECP to postpone the Senate elections, stating that the polls would remain suspended until the reserved seats’ candidates were sworn in.

The matter was subsequently taken to the Supreme Court, which ordered the allocation of reserved seats to the Sunni Ittehad Council. However, the ECP filed a review petition against the order, which is still pending before the Supreme Court.

During the proceedings in the PHC, the ECP’s Special Secretary Arshad Khan informed the court that the review petition regarding the reserved seats was under consideration in the Supreme Court.

In a separate petition filed by Azam Swati, a technocrat candidate for the Senate elections, the matter was brought before the court again. The ECP was repeatedly given time to make a decision but failed to resolve the issue.

The court noted that despite several hearings, the ECP did not provide a satisfactory response.

In its verdict, the court observed that it had no choice but to direct the ECP to decide the matter within two months and issue a clear ruling in accordance with the law. Ali Zaman Advocate represented the petitioner in court.