Shehbaz-led alliance secures two-thirds majority in NA

ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PMLN) and its allies have obtained a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly after the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) distributed the reserved seats among the ruling partners that were denied to the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC).

For any government to obtain a two-thirds majority in the 336-strong National Assembly, the backing of 224 lawmakers is required.

Considering the current numbers, the Shehbaz Shairif-led coalition government — comprising Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), MQM-Pakistan (MQM-P), Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PMLQ), Istehkam-e-Pakistan Party (IPP), Pakistan Muslim League-Zia (PMLZ), Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) and National Party (NP) — has 230 members in the lower house.

The PMLN’s tally stands at 123 in the lower house and 75 out of those are general seats won by the party in the February 8 general elections. Later, nine independent lawmakers also joined the party, taking the tally to 84. However, with the allocation of 23 reserved seats [17 women and 4 minorities], the number reached 107.

Similarly, after the ECP ruling on the remaining reserved seats, the party got the lion’s share, bagging 15 out of the remaining 20 reserved seats for women and one out of the three remaining seats reserved for minorities. The PML-N now has 123 members, becoming the largest party in the NA. On the other hand, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-backed SIC stands at the second position with 82 seats, PPP now has 73 seats, including 54 general seats, 16 women and another three reserved seats for minorities.

Moreover, MQM-P stands at number four with a tally of 22 MNAs, including 17 general seats and five reserved seats, four women and one minority.

Likewise, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUIF) has 11 seats in the lower house. Out of the 11, the party had won six general seats while it got four women and one minority seat.

The PML-Q has five seats, including three general, one independent and one seat reserved for women was also allocated to it. The IPP has four seats in the National Assembly, including three general and one reserved for women.

Similarly, six political parties have one general seat, including BAP, Majlis Wahdat-e-Muslimeen (MWM), PML-Z, Balochistan National Party (BNP), Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) and the National Party (NP).

Two seats in the NA remain vacant as the elections on the NA-8 Bajaur constituency were not held while ECP is yet to issue the notification of the winning candidate of NA-146 Khanewal.

Apart from the National Assembly, the ECP has also started distributing reserved seats of provincial assemblies denied to the SIC.In the Sindh Assembly, the ECP has allocated one minority seat to PPP while two reserved seats have been allocated to PPP and MQM-P.

With the allocation of additional seats, PPP’s number in the Sindh Assembly has increased to 116 while MQM stands with 37 seats; whereas, the SIC has nine seats, Grand Democratic Alliance three and Jamaat-e-Islami one.

Meanwhile, the ECP has also notified the 10 women reserved seats in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly, eight have been allocated to JUI-F and two to PML-N.

Interestingly, Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s party which could only get seven seats after the Feb 8 polls has been awarded 10 reserved seats.