ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairperson Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari rejected rumours suggesting Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) senators did not vote for the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) candidates in Friday’s election for the posts of Senate chairperson and deputy chairperson.
Senate chairman Sadiq Sanjrani, who was backed by the government and its coalition partners, received 48 votes against Yousaf Raza Gillani, joint candidate of the PDM alliance, who secured 42.
In a second win for the ruling coalition, Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) Senator Mirza Muhammad Afridi was elected deputy chairman, beating Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, another opposition candidate.
Seven ballots in favor of Gillani and one vote for both Gillani and Sanjrani were invalidated because they were improperly stamped, according to Senator Muzaffar Hussain Shah who supervised the vote.
During a press talk Saturday, Bilawal, when asked if reports of PML-N senators having abstained from voting for PDM candidates, said: “Everyone showed loyalty.”
“I know, we all know, that we won [Senate seats] because of PDM’s unity,” he said and added the Friday’s poll “washed the stain of the past Senate elections”.
Friday’s vote was marred by opposition cries of foul after critical ballots for Gillani were invalidated and the discovery earlier in the day of spy-cameras at the main polling booth.
“It is robbery,” said Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) secretary general Ahsan Iqbal, raising the possibility of a lawsuit to challenge the declared results.
SENATE BUREAUCRACY ‘NOT FIT FOR JOB’:
Separately, in a press conference, PPP leader from Sindh Saeed Ghani said he, along with Farooq Naek and Ali Qasim Gillani, had asked the Senate secretary Qasim Samad Khan about the “correct way” of stamping the ballot papers.
“We asked him [Khan] that often it happens [that] voter puts stamps on the name of the candidate […] so is that vote valid or invalid?” he said.
To this, Khan responded that “the vote [would be] completely valid because it is inside the box,” Ghani added.
A PPP lawmaker posed the same question to PPP Senator Sherry Rehman and she too had confirmed from Khan that the vote would be counted, and not declared invalid, he said.
“When they did all this drama and [the presiding officer] was rejecting votes [with stamps on the name of the candidates], Sherry Rehman again went to the secretary […] seeking to clear up the confusion.”
The secretary then says very innocently that the presiding officer has overruled me.”
Ghani also accused Khan of masterminding the spy cameras “drama”. However, authorities ordered a probe into the incident and removed the devices, Senator Shah said in televised comments.
