Senate to elect new chiefs today

ISLAMABAD: The Senate will meet today (Monday) to elect its new Chairman and Deputy Chairman.

As per details, a special Senate session, summoned by President Mamnoon Hussain, will begin at 10:00am today where 52 newly-elected members of the upper house will take oath, after that the 104-member Senate would elect its new chairman and deputy chairman.

While Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have announced to vote for Sadiq Sanjrani for chairmanship and Saleem Mandviwala for deputy chairmanship.

As far as PML-N is concerned, its Quaid Nawaz Sharif will announce the final candidate for the slot of the Senate chairman today (Monday) before the election , while  ML-N and its allied parties reached a consensus that the deputy chairman would be from allies and his name would also be announced before the election.

It is pertinent to note that outgoing Chairman Senate Raza Rabbani was elected unopposed.

The senators who would be swearing in today secured their respective seats of the upper house earlier on March 3.

As per constitutional and electoral provisions, half of the senators retire every three years.

Outgoing Chairman Senate Raza Rabbani and Deputy Chairman Abdul Ghafoor Haideri completed their term yesterday (March 11) and stood retired.