By Muhammad Najeeb, IANS
Islamabad : The ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid-i-Azam (PML-Q) is confident that President Pervez Musharraf will have smooth sailing in the presidential elections as the party and its allies have more than 55 percent votes in the assemblies.
“I don’t see any problem in the elections, General Musharraf will get the required numbers,” said Minister of State for Information Tariq Azim, adding that even if the opposition resigns, the elections for the president’s office will be held.
Minister for Railways Sheikh Rashid Ahmed said the ruling alliance has more than 55 percent votes in the present assemblies but “to give more legitimacy and to make the elections non-controversial we want other parties like Pakistan Peoples Party to vote for Musharraf”.
The PPP however said that they would take a final decision in a meeting on Sep 27 on the presidential elections. PPP parliamentarian Raza Rabbani said that they have several options including of resigning from the assemblies.
On the other hand, All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) Friday announced that their members would be resigning from the assemblies on Sep 29. Their leaders claimed in a press conference that the decision was unanimous. However, in the evening Maulana Fazlur Rehman, whose Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam is an important party in the alliance, said that he had not been taken into confidence while taking this “extreme” decision.
Talking to TV channels from Saudi Arabia where he has gone to perform Umra, he said that no one bothered to talk to him “before or after the decision”. However, his deputy chief in the party Hafiz Hussain Ahmed was present at the meeting and the press conference.
According to the Election Commission schedule, the results for the presidential elections will be announced the same day – Oct 6 – when the polling takes place. And the new president will be administered the oath of office by Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Iftikhar M. Chaudhry.
If Musharraf wins the election for a second term, he will be administered the oath by Justice Chaudhry whom he had sacked in March this year but was restored by the Supreme Court.
According to the provisions for electing a president, the electoral college for presidential elections consists both the houses of parliament – Senate and the National Assembly – and four provincial assemblies. The total strength of members in all the houses is 1,170 but in the presidential elections the number of votes would be far less if one goes by the constitutional provisions.
According to the constitution, for presidential elections the members of Senate and National Assembly have ‘one member one vote’ while the procedure for provincial assemblies is different. The constitution says that which ever provincial assembly has least number of members, the number of votes in other provincial assemblies will be reduced to that number.
Presently Balochistan Assembly has the least members at 65, whereas Punjab has 371, Sindh 168 and North West Frontier Province (NWFP) 124. The National Assembly has 342 members and Senate 100.
According to rules for the presidential elections, the number of votes obtained by a candidate from any provincial assembly will be multiplied by the number of members in the provincial assembly, which has least members and divided by the total number of members in that particular assembly.
Suppose in Punjab Assembly any presidential candidate gets 200 votes out of the total strength of 371. The votes obtained will be multiplied by 65 (the number of members in Balochistan Assembly being the smallest in size) and divided by the total number of members in the Punjab Assembly. (200 X 65 = 13,000/371=35) This means the candidate has received 35 votes from the Punjab Assembly.