Islamabad: The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the Peshawar High Court and the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) decision to share seats given to other parties.
A three-judge bench headed by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah allowed the appeal and the case was adjourned till June 3.
The PHC, in an earlier ruling, dashed PTI’s hopes of getting reserved seats when it rejected an appeal challenging the Sunni Ittehad Council’s (SIC) decision denying the party reserved seats.
A PTI-backed independent candidate has found a new home in SIK after the party lost its electoral symbol following a verdict in an intraparty election case.
This is the first time that PTI managed to get relief from the apex court during the tenure of CJP Kazi Faez Isa.
At the hearing this morning. Justice Shah summoned the Attorney General of Pakistan (AGP) and a representative of the ECP, who accepted the appeal before the court.
As the hearing began, Justice Shah said that the basic principle of democracy and the constitution is the mandate of the people, which should be reflected in Parliament.
“The majority cannot be rejected on technical grounds,” the court said.
The party also asked PML-N, PPPP etc. to reserve seats in the Constitution or Election Law. He wondered if it would be distributed to other parties.
Judge Athar Minallah said, “If a political party cannot have an election symbol, its voters will be disenfranchised.”
Additional attorney general Chaudhry Amir Rehman said the matter required “constitutional interpretation” and suggested that a larger bench be constituted for the case.
However, the trial is reported to be in the “consent phase”.
The party said that after the first session, the issue of the demand for more seats will be discussed.
The JIM, which consists of PTI-backed MPs, on April 1 stripped the party of the vacant seats following the PHC’s March 14 order.
Arza said that the PTI candidates had joined the SIK after losing the party’s election symbol and said that the ECP had not raised any objection to the above-mentioned independent candidates joining the SIK.
The party is a basic requirement of the proportional representation system for the allocation of special seats for women and non-Muslims as mentioned in Article 51(6)(d)(e) and 106(3)(c) of the Constitution, 1973, before a general election one political party is not related to the fact that it sends a list of candidates for reserved seats or that the party participates in the election.
Instead, the party stated that the main constitutional basis for the right to reserve seats in the proportional representation system is defined by “the total number of seats in the National Assembly awarded by each political party from its respective province” or “the total number”. of the total number of seats secured by each political party in the provincial parliament.
On March 4, the ECP received a petition from the rival parties and decided that the seats in the National Assembly and the provincial assembly will not remain vacant and will be allocated through the process of proportional representation of political parties based on the seats won by political parties. .
