PTI emerges with most seats in NA but loses crucial Islamabad seat to PDM

ISLAMABAD: The PTI did end up becoming the largest party in the Senate elections by notching 18 seats. However, it was a bittersweet victory for the ruling party since it lost its key Islamabad seat to the Pakistan Democratic Movement’s (PDM) Yousaf Raza Gillani.

After the votes were counted on Wednesday following the Senate vote, the former prime minister beat the federal minister by 5 votes, polling 169 votes against Shaikh’s 164 votes.

Six votes in total were rejected while one was not cast, according to the results.

Following the victory, PPP chairperson and PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz both called on PM Imran Khan to step down, saying that Gilani’s upset victory in the Senate was proof that the prime minister no longer commanded the majority of the house.

Following Shaikh’s defeat, the government decided that the prime minister will take a vote of confidence from the National Assembly, said Foreign Minister and Vice Chairman Pakistan Tehrik-e-Insaf (PTI) Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Wednesday.

“PTI has unanimously decided that Prime Minister Imran Khan will take a vote of confidence from the National Assembly,” Qureshi had said while addressing a press conference a day earlier along with Federal Ministers Shafqat Mehmood, Asad Umar, Shireen Mazari, Fawad Chaudhry, Syed Ali Haider Zaidi, Hammad Azhar and others.

He described the victory of Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani as “negation of democracy” as well as the endorsement of Prime Minister Imran Khan’s apprehensions of corrupt practices in the Senate elections.

The foreign minister had said the way voting was done on the Capital’s general seat , strengthened the PTI’s narrative about use of money in the Senate elections.

“We were apprehensive that the elections will be bought and the buyers of conscience will buy the votes using the name of democracy.”