ISLAMABAD – In what appeared to be a shocking defeat for the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM), the candidates backed by PTI-led ruling alliance on Friday won the election of Chairman and Deputy Chairman Senate in a nail-biting though ‘controversial’ contest.
Despite having majority in the Upper House, the PDM, an alliance of 11-partry opposition, lost the key election, thanks to several rejected votes.
The Senate election that was already facing controversies became more scandalous ahead of the voting for the two top offices of the Upper House of Parliament when some ‘spy cameras’ allegedly were found in the polling booth.
Muhammad Sadiq Sanjrani won another term for the chairman Senate due to the rejected eight votes. He secured 48 votes by defeating opposition PDM’s candidate Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani who secured 42 votes out of the total 98 polled votes in the 100-member house.
The second victory was obtained by PTI-led alliance candidate Mirza Muhammad Afridi who elected deputy chairman Senate by securing 54 against his rival PDM candidate Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri who bagged 44 votes.
The government alliance jubilated over the victory of the two candidates with Information Minister Shibli Faraz saying that they had “buried the politics of PDM.” The ruling party said that it had settled the score with opposition PDM who had made an upset in the March 3 Senate election by defeating its candidate on a seat of Islamabad despite its majority in the National Assembly.
The opposition challenged the result of Senator Sanjrani after the Presiding Officer Senator Syed Muzaffar Hussain Shah rejected those seven disputed votes cast in favour of former PM and PPP Senator Gilani.
The stamps on rejected ballot papers were placed on Gilani’s name instead of affixing in front of the box against his name. Another 8th vote was also rejected because the voter had stamped ballot paper ‘wrongly’ by voting in favour of both the candidates.
Surprisingly, none of the senators got their votes cancelled in the election of Deputy Chairman Senate giving rise to the speculations that those eight members, whose votes were rejected, intentionally did this to support Sanjrani and then the same members cast votes in favour of Afridi.
According to the result announced by Presiding Officer, Sanjrani won the election with a margin of six votes while Afridi won the slot of deputy chairman Senate with a margin of 10 votes. Total 98 votes were polled in the 100-member house because opposition Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) Senator Mushtaq Ahmed abstained from voting while Senator-elect Ishaq Dar lives in exile and had not taken oath of his office since his election in March 2018. In the 99-member house excluding Senator-elect Dar, the opposition has 52 members while PTI-led collation has 47 seats.
The election of the chairman Senate was held after 48 newly elected senator took oath for a six-year term and then the presiding officer announced scheduled of the election. After Sanjrani declared winner and took oath of his office, he got conducted the election of deputy chairman Senate.
The members cast the votes in alphabetical order with JUI-F Senator Moulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri was the first one to cast his vote and PTI Senator Zeeshan Khanzada was the last voter to cast his vote. The Presiding Officer Shah, who cast the last vote, announced that all 98 senators present in the House had cast their votes and they would make an interval for 20 minutes to close the polling at 5:00pm and to wait for JI lawmaker to cast his vote. After this, the bells were rung for one minute for JI lawmaker but the person did not appear.
After the final count was made before polling agents and the presiding officer rejected the seven disputed votes, Gilani’s polling agent PPP Senator Farooq H Naek protested the decision and argued that the instructions written on the paper only stated that the stamp had to be marked inside the box of the preferred candidate, and did not specify on “which area of the box” the stamp had to be affixed. He said that stamps of rejected votes had been affixed inside the box. “Either these instructions should be torn down or these votes should be accepted,” he said adding that votes should be rejected only if stamps had been put outside the box. He also said that the rules are silent on this. “Why should the voters suffer because of mistake of (Senate) Secretariat?”
On the other hand, Sanjrani’s polling agent PTI Senator Mohsin Aziz while reading out from written instructions placed in the house said these clearly stated that the vote had to be stamped in the box in front of the preferred candidate’s name, and not on top of the candidate’s name.
After hearing both sides, Senator Shah ruled that given the construction of the ballot paper and according to written instruction, stamp had to be placed in front of the candidate’s name. “In all, these seven ballot papers are rejected,” he said and declared Sanjrani as the winner.
As opposition members protested, the presiding officer asked them to appeal the ruling “in the election tribunal” if they didn’t agree with it.
Soon after the victory of Sanjrani was announced, the treasury lawmakers rose from their seats and jubilated over this shocking win for the opposition. The visitors sitting in the galleries also raised slogans in favour of PTI, Balochistan Awami Party (BAP), Prime Minister Imran Khan and Chief Minister Balochistan Jam Kamal Khan Alyani. The slogans like PM Imran Khan Zindabad (long live PM Imran Khan) and BAP Zindabad (long live BAP) were raised from there.
Chairman Senate Sadiq Sanjrani in his remarks after assuming his position thanked PM Imran Khan, CM Balochistan, Defence Minister Pervez Khattak, the PTI, the BAP and the house for his win.
Many important leaders of the ruling PTI witnessed the election process while sitting from the galleries.
They included Governor Sindh Imran Ismail, Defence Minister Pervez Khattak, Special Assailant to CM Punjab on Information Dr Firdous Ashiq Awan, Secretary General PTI Amir Mehmood Kayani. PML-N leader Mariyum Aurengzeb was also among those who were sitting in the galleries.
The opposition lawmakers while talking to reporters outside the parliament house said that they would challenge the results of the Senate chairman election. “We will approach the court against the decision,” PPP leader and former PM Raja Pervaiz Ashraf told reporters. Senator Mustafa Nawaz Khokhar said that PPP would either challenge the result in a court or bring a no-confidence motion against Sanjrani.
Back in August 2019, Chairman Senate Sanjrani had survived no-confidence vote in an opposition-dominated house when 14 members of the opposition had crossed the floor.
Earlier in the day, as many as 48 newly-elected senators took oath of allegiance to Pakistan in the Upper House of the Parliament for a term of six years. Senate Secretary Mohammad Qasim Samad Khan welcomed all existing and newly-elected members and handed over the chair to Senator Sayed Muzfar Hussain Shah, who had been nominated as Presiding Officer for special sitting of the House by President Dr Arif Alvi.
Presiding Officer Sayed Muzafar Hussain Shah administered the oath to the newly-elected members, who reached the country’s top constitutional forum for national service after getting votes from members of the national and provincial assemblies.
Sadiq Sanjrani belongs to Khan Bahadur family of Sanjrani tribe in Chaghi. He was born on April 14 1978 and got his basic education from his village Nokundi. To get higher education Sanjrani went to Islamabad and obtained a master degree in International Relations.
His political career started in 2018 when he was elected as a senator on an independent ticket on March 3. He was later backed by the leading opposition groups, including PPP, PTI, MQM-P and independents from Balochistan, and FATA for the slot of Senate’s chairman.
In 2018, Sanjarani survived a no confidence motion by the Opposition — that came as a surprise victory for the PTI-led government and its coalition partners. Before starting a proper political career Sanjrani has served on high profile government positions including Coordinator of Grievances Cell at Prime Minister’s Secretariat in 1999 and was also a member of the Prime Minister Inspection Commission.
Sanjrani has remained a member of the Quetta Chamber of Commerce and Industry, ex-Director of the Board of Sheikh Khalifa Bin Zayed Hospital, Quetta, and the founder-president Society for the Services of Humanity (SFSH).
Meanwhile, the newly elected deputy chairman senate Mirza Muhammad Afridi 45, a well-known businessman of Pakistan hailing from Khyber district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is a new face in the senate and politics who entered the upper house of Parliament for the first time back in 2018 as an independent candidate who later on joined Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) but soon after joining PML-N, Afridi parted his ways and joined PTI after a meeting with PM Imran Khan in Bani Gala.
According to some media reports, Mirza Afridi who is a famous businessman in textile industry and is also the owner of “Rooba” had nothing to do with politics before 2018 senate elections and was known as a businessman.
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