KARACHI (Reuters) – A senior politician in Pakistan who recently won the provincial elections in Karachi has decided to relinquish his seat, citing allegations of vote rigging in his favor. This comes after the national and provincial elections held on Feb. 8 were overshadowed by accusations of rigging, particularly to defeat independent candidates supported by imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan.
The caretaker government and Pakistan’s election commission have both dismissed these allegations, asserting that the country has the necessary laws and systems in place to investigate specific complaints.
The declared winner of provincial seat 129 in Karachi, Hafiz Naeem ur Rehman of the Islamist Jamaat-e-Islami party, secured more than 26,000 votes. However, Rehman claims that he discovered discrepancies in the votes cast for Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party-backed independent candidate Saif Bari. According to Rehman, the votes for Bari were reduced from 31,000 to 11,000 when the records of votes polled at individual polling stations were tabulated.
Imran Khan, who is currently imprisoned on corruption and criminal charges following a fallout with the country’s powerful military, had his PTI party barred from contesting elections, thus leading its members to have to stand as independents. The military has denied any involvement in meddling with politics.
“Public opinion should be respected, let the winner win, let the loser lose, no one should get anything extra,” Rehman stated to Reuters on Wednesday.
“I will not accept it, the winner should be given the victory.”
As of now, Saif Bari has not been reachable for comment, and the PTI has requested time to provide a response. When reached for comment, the election commission did not immediately respond to the request.
(Writing by Ariba Shahid; Editing by YP Rajesh and Ros Russell)
