Pakistan opposition party calls for investigation of election ‘rigging’

Pakistan’s main opposition party called on Sunday for a judicial investigation into what it said was rigging at an election this week that it lost. Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreeke-Insaf, or Pakistan Movement for Justice, emerged as the largest single party in last Wednesday’s vote, defeating the Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz (PML-N) party of jailed former prime minister Nawaz Sharif. During the campaign, Sharif said the military had influenced the judiciary to deny him a second term. The military denied this. It has ruled Pakistan for about half the time since the country’s formation in 1947. “We demand constitution of a

PML-N will not accept these elections as legitimate and we are ready to ... start movement along with other parties. Mushahid Ullah Khan Pakistan Muslim League - Nawaz senior leader

judicial commission to probe incidents that took place on July 25,” senior party leader Khawaja Asif told reporters in Lahore. “We will issue a white paper on the election rigging and other incidents.”

“PML-N will not accept these elections as legitimate and we are ready to ... start movement along with other parties,” Mushahid Ullah Khan, a senior leader, told reporters.

PTI did better than expected to win 16.86 million votes and beat PML-N, which got nearly 13 million votes. PTI opened coalition talks with at least one smaller party and independent politicians last Saturday.