Sharif’s wife Kulsoom edges ahead in bypoll
In a first for Pakistan, biometric voter verification machines used
LAHORE: Polling was held on Sunday for the NA-120 seat vacated by former prime minister Nawaz Sharif after the Supreme Court disqualified him, with a large number of people coming to cast their votes in the Lahore locality.
The poll was expected to be a close fight between Sharif’s PML-N party and Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-insaf party.
At the time of going to print, the results shared by the Pakistan Election Commission with the media showed that PML-N’S candidate — Sharif’s wife Begum Kulsoom Nawaz — was edging ahead of PTI’S Yasmin Rashid.
Kusloom had managed 35,600 votes against Rashid’s 28,000.
A total of 44 candidates are contesting for the National Assembly seat. Pakistan Army personnel supervised the polling process.
Many voters complained that the process inside the polling stations was taking too long and that the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) should take notice.
Some polling stations were reported to be without electricity.
Hours after polling started, PTI activists and PML-N almost came to blows at Cooper Road, chanting slogans against each other. Law enforcement personnel warned the political workers of baton charge, following which the activists dispersed.
This constituency has thrice elected Nawaz Sharif as the country’s prime minister since 1990. For the first time in the history of Pakistan, biometric voter verification machines are also being tested in the constituency. Some 30,000 voters will be casting their votes on biometric machines
The seat has long been controlled by Sharif and his allies, but the by-election is seen as a test for PML-N.
A candidate from the Milli Muslim League, a new political party backed by Jamaat-ut-dawa (JUD), which is listed by the United Nations as a terror outfit, is also standing. Muhammad Yaqub Sheikh is running as an independent candidate because his party has not yet been registered by the election commission.
Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the leader of JUD, is under “preventative detention” but photographs of him appeared on Sheikhs’ campaign posters.