Oath Taking of Newly Elected Senators Took Place Today
Oath Taking of Newly Elected Senators Took Place Today:
A special Senate session called by President Mamnoon Hussain that began at 10:00am was chaired by presiding officer Sardar Yaqoob today. Almost 51 newly-elected members of the upper house took oath. These senators got their respective seats on March 3rd 2018. Half of the senators retire every 3 years following the constitutional and electoral provisions.
In the oath taking ceremony, Ex. finance minister Ishaq Dar was not present as he is abroad for the treatment.
The 104 seats of Senate comprises of 66 general seats, 17 women, 17 technocrat and 4 minorities seats. Each province has 23 seats, including 14 general seats, 4 women seats, 4 technocrat seats and a non-Muslim seat. FATA has 8 general seats in the Senate while Islamabad has 4 seats, including 2 general seats, a women seat and a technocrat seat.
Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) won 15 seats in the Upper House, winning 11 seats from Punjab and 2 from Islamabad and KPK. Total seats of PML N backed candidate are 33. After adding the number of senators from its allies, the number has gone upto 48. They claim to gain the support of 5 senators from MQMP, 2 out of 8 from FATA and 1 each from ANP and 1 from Balochistan National Party (Mengal).
PPP, secured 10 seats from Sindh and 2 from KPK, achieved 12 seats.
PTI took 5 seats from KPK and 1 from Punjab.
2 candidates of the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam (JUI)-F, Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party and National Party each, 1 candidate from each of the MQM, 1 from Jamaat-i-Islami and 1 from PML-F were successful on the 52 of the 104 Senate seats.
12 of the seats went to the independent candidates.
53 votes are required to elect the chairman and deputy chairman for the Upper House of parliament.
If PTI & PPP gain support from FATA members, they would be in the position to make their candidate as the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the House.
Outgoing Chairman Senate Raza Rabbani and Deputy Chairman Abdul Ghafoor Haideri completed their term and stood retired. However, Raza Rabbani is reelected in the polls. On account of having dual-nationality case in the top court against senators 3 from the PML-N (Haroon Akhtar, Nuzhat Sadiq, Sadia Abbasi), 1 from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (Chaudhry Sarwar) and 1 independent senator (Khuda Babar), the court allowed the ECP to notify them as senators taking part in the oath taking and in the voting for chairman and deputy chairman of the Senate.
The session is suspended to recommence at 4:00 pm for the elections of Chairman and Deputy Chairman of Senate. The polling would be held via secret ballot. Following the election, the Senate chairman and deputy chairman will take oath. Nominations papers of Raja Zafar ul Haq (PML-N & Allies) & Sadiq Sanjarani (PPP & PTI) for the seat of Chairman Senate while for deputy chairman senate papers of Saleem Mandiwala (PPP) have been accepted so far.
In the absence of president of Pakistan, the Senate chairman performs duties as acting president.
After the oath-taking, the session will be suspended until further notice.