ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) announced on Wednesday that by-elections for eight National Assembly seats — vacated after the acceptance of the resignations of PTI MNAs — would be held on October 16.
In the press release issued today, the electoral watchdog said that polling would be held in the eight constituencies included NA-22 Mardan, NA-24 Charsadda, NA-31 Peshawar, NA-45 Kurram, NA-108 Faisalabad, NA-118 Nankana Sahib, NA-237 Malir and NA-239 Karachi.
The NA seats were vacated after speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf had, on July 28, accepted the resignations of PTI MNAs — nine on general seats and two on reserved seats for women.
Subsequently, the PTI chief Imran Khan announced that he would be the lone contender for all nine NA seats in a bid to set a record.
However, the PTI candidate elected from Karachi’s NA-246 Abdul Shakoor Shad, who was among the 11 lawmakers who had resigned in April, had approached the Islamabad High Court earlier this month after which he was reinstated as a MNA.
The by-elections were originally scheduled to be held during September but were postponed by the commission which cited the unavailability of security personnel in the wake of catastrophic floods across the country.
