On the Friday, the Supreme Court (SC) declared that the reserved seats should be awarded to the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC).The Peshawar High Court’s earlier order was declared unconstitutional by the 13 bench of SC. The decision supported by eight judges, it was read by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah.
This mean that the withdrawal of election symbol cannot disqualify a political party from elections. In its judgment, the LHC stated: “The PTI was and is a political party.”
The judgment also held that the withdrawal of an election symbol cannot deprive a political party of its right to participate in the elections.
Election Commissions of Pakistan for Pakistan Mansoor Usman Awan Counsels Sikandar Bashir Mohmand Makhdoom Ali Khan and affected candidates demanded that SIC is no longer qualified to occupy the reserved seats as it has not competed during the general elections or won a single seat.
Background
The SIC is the new home to independent candidates with support from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. This gives the ruling coalition 224 seats in NA, which translates to a two-third majority in a 336 NA. Out of the 25 SIC reserved seats, as much as 21 were reserved for ruling coalition in the rather contentious decision made by ECP this March that sparked public outrage.
The PML-N secured 16 of the SIC reserved seats and the PPP secured 5 of those seats only.
These seats if shifted to SIC, the strength of the ruling coalition will drop to 203 leaving it without the two-third majority in NA.
In March this year, a five-member bench of the Election Commission of Pakistan headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja turned down the SIC’s petition regarding allocation of quota of reserved seats in the national and provincial assemblies.
The ECP announced their verdict in a 4-1 majority noting that the SIC was not eligible for reserved seats.
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