ALI HUSSAIN

ISLAMABAD: Parliam-entary parties on Tuesday agreed on retaining the general seats of National Assembly after the census 2017 while nine seats from the share of Punjab province will be given to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa [five], Balochistan [three] and Islamabad [one].

The understanding was reached in a meeting of the parliamentary parties’ leaders chaired by Speaker National Assembly Sardar Ayaz here at the Parliament House in which the political parties decided for not increasing the number of general seats, i.e., 272, but instead agreed on delimitation as per the population based on the census 2017 results.

The meeting was held in the backdrop of the October 25 cabinet meeting which referred the delimitation bill to the Parliament to decide whether the number of seats could be increased from the present 342 members or not.

As per the proposal agreed in the Tuesday meeting, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa would be given a total of five additional seats, four general and one seat reserved for women, Balochistan would get three seats, two generals and one reserved for women, federal capital territory [Islamabad] will be given one general seat from the share of Punjab.

While the general seats from Sindh and Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) would remain unchanged.

At present, Punjab is topping the total number of seats of the National Assembly with 183 berths in the 342-member National Assembly, out of which 148 are general seats and 35 are reserved for women. Sindh is followed by 75 berths of which 61 are general seats and 14 are reserved for women, while Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has a total of 43 seats which include 35 general berths and eight members are on the seats reserved for women.

Similarly, Balochistan has 17 members out of them 14 are elected on general seats while three seats are reserved for women. Likewise, FATA has a total of 12 seats, all general seats, and Islamabad has two general seats.

Briefing reporters after the meeting, Ayaz Sadiq said the decision was taken unanimously not to increase the number of seats from 342 members of the National Assembly, but instead delimitation would be carried out as soon as possible based on the population as per the latest census results.

He said that efforts would be made to finalize the exercise by Thursday and passed the bill from the National Assembly on Friday, adding that the committee would again meet today (Wednesday) to give a final shape to the draft.

He said the meeting was attended by representatives from Ministry of Law and Justice, Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and Statistic Division to brief the parliamentary parties’ leaders on the bill.

The meeting was also attended by Leader of the Opposition in National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah, PPP’s Syed Naveed Qamar, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) leader Dr Farooq Sattar, JUI-F leader Akram Khan Durrani, Jamaat-e-Islami parliamentary leader Sahibzada Tariqullah, Awami National Party (ANP) leader Haji Ghulam Ahmed Bilour and other leaders of the parliamentary parties.

PPP and MQM-P raised objection on the latest census results, saying that their reservations on the provisional census results were not addressed, as MQM’s Farooq Sattar warned that the party has the right to approach the court if their reservations are not addressed.

The two parties have voiced reservations regarding the preliminary results of the census, which are serving as the basis of the current delimitation exercise, as the final results of the census are expected to be announced in April next year, which will not allow the ECP enough time to carry out the delimitation process ahead of the next general elections.

PTI’s Qureshi said that the work on the draft of the bill is being expedited so that general elections are held on time.