PESHAWAR: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leader and former senator Azam Khan Swati on Wednesday filed a fresh petition in Peshawar High Court, seeking directives for Election Commission of Pakistan to hold Senate polls in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

He also requested the court to declare as illegal two orders of ECP of March 26 and April 2, 2024, through which it had first hinted at postponing Senate polls in the province if oath was not administered to opposition MPAs-elect on reserved seats and subsequently ordering the postponement of elections in the province.

The petition has been filed through Advocate Ali Zaman wherein ECP through its secretary has been made respondent along with five candidates, who were then declared MPAs-elect on reserved seats and on whose applications the commission had postponed the polls.

On March 28, ECP declared in response to applications of five women MPAs-elect that if the speaker of provincial assembly failed to comply with the directions of the high court to administer oaths to the lawmakers elected to reserved seats, it would be constrained to postpone Senate elections in the province until the administration of oaths to the applicants.

Azam Swati wants ECP’s order about postponing elections declared illegal

Subsequently on April 2, when Senate elections were held in other provinces and Islamabad, the commission announced postponing the polls in KP till administering oath to the MPAs-elect on reserved seats.

Earlier, Mr Swati had filed a petition after the March 26 order of ECP wherein he had requested the court to order the commission to hold Senate polls in KP on April 2. However, when the high court had taken up for preliminary hearing that petition, the scheduled date of April 2 had already passed.

Following the passage of Constitution (Twenty-sixth Amendment) Act, ECP’s counsel Mohsin Kamran Siddique had objected to the earlier petition on Oct 22, stating that it was not maintainable.

He had stated that under the amended Article 199 of the Constitution, the high court should not make an order or give direction or make declaration on its own in the nature of suo motu exercise of jurisdiction beyond the contents of any application filed under Clause 1 of Article 199.

The court had then allowed Mr Swati to withdraw the earlier petition and file an amended one.

In the fresh petition Mr Swati stated that he was a contesting candidate for Senate Elections 2024 on general as well as technocrat seats.

He said that he had submitted his nomination papers after the schedule of the polls was announced on March 14.

However, he said that instead of holding the polls in KP, ECP passed the impugned order on March 26 and April 2, 2024 on application of five of women, who were at that time declared elected on seats reserved. He contended that he, though a contesting candidate, had not been heard by ECP and was instead made to suffer at instance of the five women respondents.

He pointed out that Supreme Court of Pakistan had set to rest the issue of reserved seats for women and non-Muslims by setting aside the order of ECP of awarding seats to candidates of other parties and a judgement of PHC in that regard.

He contended that after the apex court judgement no justification was left with the ECP to further delay the holding of senate polls in KP.

Published in Dawn, November 7th, 2024