The Imran Khan-led federal government has played a clever play card by considering holding the Senate elections earlier and approaching the Supreme Court to hold the polls through ‘show of hands’.
The announcement has come as a major shock to the opposition and has sparked a new debate in the country. The government says the show of hands will ensure transparency in the Senate election.
Let’s take an in-depth review of the government’s decision and the opposition’s stance regarding the Senate elections.
Senate of Pakistan
The Senate of Pakistan is the upper house of the Parliament of Pakistan. It consists of 104 senators with each senator serving a 6-year term. The elections are conducted triennially for half the seats in the senate.
Senate elections take place in accordance with Article 59 of the Constitution. Each of the four provincial assemblies elects in the next Senate election twenty-three members from their respective provinces that include fourteen on general seats, four on seats reserved for technocrats including Ulema, four on seats reserved for women and one on seat reserved for non-Muslims.
Presently, the PPP has a majority in the upper house with 27 senators. On the other hand, PML-N has 26, MQM has 8, ANP has 7, PTI has 7, JUI-F has 5, PML-Q has 4, BNP, has 4, National Party 3, Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party 3, Jamaat-e-Islami has one, 6 independent members and 2 seats are vacant.
Retiring Senators
Over 65 percent of the senators who are set to retire on March 11, 2021 after completing their six-year constitutional term belong to the opposition parties. The term-wise data of the senators shows that out of the 52 members retiring from the present 103-member Senate in March next year, 34 belong to the opposition parties and 18 from the treasury benches.
The PML-N will be the biggest loser in terms of representation in the Senate as 57 percent of its members are set to retire. The data shows that eight members of the PPP are among the 52 senators who will be completing their six-year term.
As far as the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) is concerned, seven of its present 14 senators — mostly from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa — are due to retire next year. The PTI, which got representation in the Senate for the first time in 2015, is not only set to improve its representation but also has the chance to become the single largest party in the house due to its numerical strength in the Punjab and KP assemblies.
Horse Trading and Show of Hands
During the Senate elections, the issue of buying and selling of votes in the country comes to the fore. Political parties openly try to win votes by offering different incentives to other party members.
In the past, various political parties won seats despite not having a numerical majority in the provincial assemblies and last year the opposition party failed despite having a numerical majority in the no-confidence motion against Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani.
The government has announced that elections will be held through show of hands to stop rigging and horse trading in the Senate elections.
Show of hands refers to voting that is cast for any resolution where the members use their hands to vote for or against the resolution. Whereas, voting by poll refers to a system where polling paper is distributed among the members present at the meeting.
Can the new method be used?
According to the Pakistan Constitution, elections to fill seats in the Senate allocated to each Province shall be held in accordance with the system of proportional representation by means of the single transferable vote.
According to legal experts, there is no need to amend the Constitution to hold the Senate elections through a show of hands, and only the Elections Act, 2017 is required to be changed through a presidential ordinance.
However, they recommended that in view of the sensitivity and significance of the matter, it may be prudent to seek the opinion of the Supreme Court on the issue under its advisory jurisdiction as per Article 186.
