MULTAN: Abdul Qadir Gilani and Ali Musa Gilani, sons of former prime minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, who contested from NA-154 and NA-157 respectively, announced moving the election tribunal while expressing their lack of confidence over the respective returning officers.

On the other hand, the Election Commission of Pakistan has directed the returning officer in NA-158 to recount the votes on the appeal of former prime minister.

Addressing a press conference here on Sunday, Qadir Gilani said a number of ballot papers cast against him did not have the thumb impressions [of voters]. “I informed the returning officer about the matter while showing him over 100 votes from a female polling booth without voters’ thumbs and requested to decide it first who, however, stated that the matter does not fall in his jurisdiction.”

He said votes of 50 polling booths were to be examined but, on the first booth, the RO disagreed to cancel the [pointed] vote saying whatever he (Qadir) said could be right but it was not his jurisdiction to cancel the votes.

He said the RO told him that he could do only recount and even cannot allow him to examine the counterfoils.

“Over this situation I decided to boycott the recounting and will go to next forum to contest the matter as I am very much sure that I have won the election,” he said.

Qadir Gilani said he would also go for the Nadra verification of voters besides the forensic examination of the thumb impressions.

Ali Musa Gilani said votes on the symbol of arrow are not being counted.

“The vote of PTI is not being counted in my favour but my vote is being counted in the favour of the PTI candidate. A number of votes of PML-N are even being counted for the PTI,” he alleged.

He said bags of all the three candidates should be examined as there are a number of votes in PTI bag which are of the PPP and PML-N.

He said the rejected votes are also not being examined.

“When the law provided for recounting if the margin is less than 10,000 vote, why are the ROs denying recounting?” he said.

Musa Gilani said no one knows where were the presiding officers at night whereas they were bound to submit their result at RO office.

“I waited till next morning but presiding officers were nowhere. Votes of my constituency were found from the ballot box of another constituency. How were the votes shifted from one constituency to another?”

Meanwhile, in a letter to returning officer NA-158, Deputy Director (Elections) of ECP Atif Rahim on Sunday asked the RO concerned to recount the votes if the consolidation process has not been completed.

“The election commission has directed to recount the ballot papers as per request of the petitioner Yousaf Raza Gilani, contesting candidate from NA-158 and if the margin of the victory is less than five per cent of the total votes polled in the constituency or 10,000 votes whichever is less in accordance with the provisions of section 95,” the letter stated.

SARGODHA: The recounting of postal ballots in NA-91 completed and returning officer announced the result whereby PML N nominee Dr.Zulfikar Ali Bhatti won by a lead of 87 votes. PTI ‘s Aamer Sultan Cheema got 110,567 votes while Dr. Zulfikar Ali Bhatti polled 110,657 ballots. The request of PTI candidate for recounting of entire votes was rejected by RO.

Dr. Zulfikar Bhatti said false case was registered against his supporters as the RO allegedly avoided to announce results after three-time recount; hence they protested. He said neither they raised any derogatory slogan against the army nor the judiciary.

Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2018