Pakistan: Khan’s party says it got the support to form gov’t

The party of former president Asif Ali Zardari, Pakistan People’s Party, bagged 43 seats.

Chaudhry said that the success of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf in the general elections meant the end of decades-long dynastic rule in Pakistan.

Still, several members of Khan’s party are members of Pakistan’s traditional ruling elite. He brought them on board as so-called “electables” he needed to win at the polls.

More than 2,000 supporters of the secular Awami National Party rallied in the town of Charsadda against fraud in the vote, in which it got one seat. A small demonstration was also held in Karachi, Pakistan’s largest city, and the party called for another one on Monday.

Also Saturday, four newly elected independent lawmakers in the Punjab Assembly joined Khan’s party after meeting with him.

It means Khan will try to form a coalition government in Punjab province, which has been the stronghold of Sharif since 1980s.

Sharif’s party got slightly more seats in the Punjab Assembly than Khan’s party.

Khan’s party won a majority in the conservative Khyber Pukhtunkhwa province, while Zardari’s party dominated in the southern Sindh’s provincial legislature. The restive Baluchistan province, which is troubled by militant violence, was won by a mix of small parties that will have to form a coalition to rule.

Sharif is being held at a jail in the garrison city of Rawalpindi along with his daughter Maryam Nawaz, who was sentenced to seven years in prison in the same corruption case. Sharif was arrested on July 13 when he returned to Pakistan from London to face a 10-year prison sentence on separate corruption charges.

A Pakistani court will hear the appeals of Sharif and Nawaz on July 31.

Munir Ahmed, The Associated Press

by Canadian Press

Pakistan: Khan’s party says it got the support to form gov’t

What's Trending