Imran Khan to contest from 33 seats in Pakistan National Assembly bypoll

Of the 33 vacant seats in lower house, 12 are from Punjab province, eight from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, three from Islamabad, nine from Sindh, and one from Balochistan.

Published on: Jan 30, 2023, 07:51:35 IST

By HT News Desk

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Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief and former prime minister Imran Khan has decided to contest National Assembly bypoll from all 33 vacant seats, senior party leader Shah Mahmood Qureshi said. Addressing a press conference in Lahore on Sunday evening, PTI vice-chairman and former foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the decision was taken during the party's core committee meeting.

Imran Khan, Pakistan's former prime minister, in Lahore. (Bloomberg)

"Imran Khan will be PTI's sole candidate in all 33 parliamentary seats. The decision was taken in the party's core committee meeting which was presided over by Khan at Zaman Park Lahore on Sunday," Qureshi said.

Earlier this month, PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry had said on Twitter that Khan will be the party's candidate on all thrity-three seats. The final decision was taken after the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) announced on Friday that by-polls for 33 vacant National Assembly seats would be held on March 16.

Of the 33 vacant seats in lower house, 12 are from Punjab province, eight from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, three from Islamabad, nine from Sindh, and one from Balochistan.

The PTI lawmakers had resigned en masse from Pakistan National Assembly after Imran Khan's ouster in April 2022.

The National Assembly speaker, however, accept only 11 resignations stating that he needed to individually verify if the lawmakers were resigning of their own accord. In October last year, Khan contested eight parliamentary seats and won six of them.

Last month, National Assembly speaker Ashraf accepted the resignations of 35 PTI lawmakers, after which the ECP de-notified them. The speaker later accepted another 35 (and ECP de-notified them), and the remaining 43 resignations of PTI lawmakers after Imran Khan announced returning to the National Assembly to put Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to the test of a vote of confidence.

The ECP has yet to de-notify 43 PTI lawmakers. If the ECP de-notifies the remaining 43 PTI lawmakers, Khan's party would be virtually wiped out of the National Assembly.

(With inputs from agencies)

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