KP Assembly election in erstwhile Fata

14 ANP candidates vying for 16 general seats

By Riffatullah

PESHAWAR: The Awami National Party (ANP) has fielded 14 candidates for the 16 general seats of the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly in the merged districts where the election is due on July 20.

The Election Commission of Pakistan has allocated 16 seats for the erstwhile Fata in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly after the passage of the 25th constitutional amendment that completed the merger.

ANP’s Gul Afzal Khan will contest the election on PK-100 in the Bajaur district, which has a total of 156,237 registered voters.

The PK-101 Bajaur has 157,487 registered voters where the party has fielded Haji Lal Shah Pakhtunyar.

The PK-102 Bajaur is the largest constituency in terms of voters. It has 216,719 registered voters. The ANP has fielded its veteran member and loyalist Sheikh Jahanzada.

The Mohmand district has been allocated two constituencies. PK-103 has a total of 110,480 registered voters and PK-104 has 170,022.

The ANP has fielded Nisar Ahmad on PK-103 and Hazrat Khan on PK-104 in the Mohmand district.

Shah Hussain Shinwari is the party candidate for PK-105 in the Khyber district, where 167,484 registered voters are entitled to cast votes.

Nahid Afridi is the only female candidate from the party contesting election for the general seat on PK-106 in the Khyber district. The registered voters in PK-106 are 148,470. In fact, she is one of the two female candidates contesting for a general seat in the merged districts.

Muhammad Sadiq Chiragh is contesting election from PK-107 Khyber. The total registered voters in this constituency are 216,133.

Farooq Ahmad is the party candidate for PK-108 and Noshi Bangash for PK-109 in the Kurram district.

The registered voters in PK-108 are 172,897 while those in PK-109 are 187,844.

The total registered voters in PK-110 Orakzai are 196,436. However, the ANP has not fielded any candidate from the Orakzai district.

Sherullah Wazir is the party candidate from PK-111 North Waziristan. The registered voters in this constituency number 141,053.

Ashraf Dawar is contesting the election from PK-112 North Waziristan where total registered voters are 179,124.

The PK-113 South Waziristan has 218,835 registered voters. The ANP has not fielded a candidate from PK-113. Taj Muhammad is the party candidate for PK-114 in South Waziristan. The total registered voters here are 167,994.

The party has fielded Abdul Qadir Bhittani for erstwhile Frontier Region’s PK-115 constituency which has 191,062 registered voters.

The ANP had failed to win any seat out of the 12 National Assembly seats in the erstwhile Fata in the July 2018 general election. It is trying with a renewed effort to win seats this time for the provincial assembly. However, the party head Asfandyar Wali Khan didn’t campaign in the tribal districts. The campaigning was done mostly by the ANP central general secretary Mian Iftikhar Hussain and provincial president Aimal Wali Khan, the son of Asfandyar Wali Khan.