KP Assembly speaker, deputy speaker elected amid rowdy scenes

PESHAWAR: Babar Saleem Swati was elected as Speaker and Suriya Bibi Deputy Speaker of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly as rowdy scenes were witnessed in the provincial legislature on the second consecutive day on Thursday.

The nominated Chief Minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Ali Amin Gandapur, will be sworn in on Saturday.

Mushtaq Ghani, the outgoing speaker, administered the oath to Swati.

Swati bagged 89 votes while Suriya of the same party -- Sunni Ittehad Council having independently elected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) members -- received 87 ballots.

Suriya is the only woman member of the provincial legislature who has been elected to general seat on the PTI ticket from the conservative and under-developed remote Upper Chitral district. Like many other districts in KP, the PTI swept Chitral. The party candidates had won one seat in the National Assembly and two seats in the provincial assembly from the district.

Ihsanullah Miankhel, a joint candidate of the opposition parties for the speaker’s position, got 17 votes.

Arbab Wasim, elected on the PTI Parliamentarians (PTIP) ticket from Peshawar, was a joint candidate of the opposition parties for the deputy speaker’s slot. He received 19 votes.

The two votes of PTI MPAs which were not polled to the party candidate for the deputy speaker, Suriya Bibi, went to Arbab Wasim. Arbab Wasim had won the election on a PTI ticket in 2018 from Peshawar, but following the May 9 violent protests, he quit PTI and joined the Pervez Khattak-led PTIP.

He and Iqbal Wazir, a former PTI MPA from North Waziristan tribal district, who was later made a cabinet member, were elected on the PTIP ticket.

For the first time in the history of KP Assembly, speaker and deputy speaker were elected by such a big margin. Of the 115 elected members, only 106 of them took part in the election process of custodians of the house.

Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUIF) boycotted the election process. All nine MPAs of the party didn’t attend the assembly session. Also, two more members of the house, Abdul Manam Khan and Laiq Khan, were sworn in on Thursday.

Meanwhile, Dr Ibadullah Khan submitted his application for the opposition leader’s slot. The newly-elected speaker, Babar Saleem Swati, accepted his application. Dr Ibadullah Khan is the younger brother of Engineer Amir Muqam Khan, president of PMLN Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Both PMLN and JUIF had nine members each in the house, but JUIF was reportedly not interested in the opposition leader’s post. Former chief minister Akram Khan Durrani was the opposition leader in the previous assembly. He has developed some health issues and reportedly expressed unwillingness to continue his previous work in the new assembly.

Maulana Lutfur Rahman, the younger brother of Maulana Fazlur Rahman, is also a member of the assembly but didn’t submit an application for the opposition leader’s position.

All the opposition parties have 28 members in the house, and the number is stated to be too small to requisite the assembly session. The assembly requisition requires 37 members of the legislative body.

Earlier, the house saw vociferous sloganeering by the PTI supporters in the gallery when PMLN MPA Sobia Shahid rose from her seat to cast a ballot for the speaker and deputy speaker’s election. She was jeered by the PTI members during the maiden session as well when they were forced into the visitors gallery. Even footwear and other articles were thrown at her when she displayed wristwatches in the hall that offended the PTI supporters.

Sobia Shahid went to the Chief Minister-designate Ali Amin Gandapur to register a complaint when she faced sloganeering. Gandupur asked the PTI supporters to keep calm.