Internal rifts over ticket allocation pose challenge to PTI in PS-88 by-poll

The emergence of differences among the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s local ranks over the party ticket’s allocation for the PS-88 by-election has affected the party’s intensified efforts to snatch the constituency from the jaws of the Pakistan People’s Party, analysts said.

The PTI has issued a ticket to Jansher Junejo as its candidate for the PS-88 by-election. The PTI’s decision has angered the party’s district president for Malir rural Qadir Bakhsh Kalmati and other office-bearers “for not being consulted” on the process of awarding the ticket.

Kalmati is an influential political figure in the constituency and a strong aspirant for the ticket. However, the PTI has preferred to give tickets to Junejo, a leader who has served in various positions in the party.

On Friday, PTI district leaders had announced in a meeting, presided over by Kalmati, they would resign from their party positions in protest over them being ignored in the ticket allocation decisions. They said that they would continue to work as ordinary members of the party.

The Sindh Assembly constituency, PS-88, had fallen vacant due to the death of Pakistan Peoples Party MPA and provincial minister Ghulam Murtaza Baloch from the novel coronavirus infection in June last year.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has announced that the by-poll to the seat will be held on February 16.

Although a former member of the National Assembly belonging to the PPP, Abdul Hakeem Baloch, was considered a strong candidate for the by-poll in the constituency, the PPP leadership has given a ticket to Yousaf Murtaza Baloch, son of the deceased MPA. In the 2018 general election, the PPP’s Ghulam Baloch had won the PS-88 by securing 22,561 votes against 16,386 of the runner-up, Captain (retd) Muhammad Rizwan Khan, who was the PTI candidate.

Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan candidate Rizwan Ahmed ranked third after bagging 7,694 votes, while the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan’s candidate, Syed Abul Hassan, was fourth on the list by securing 5,207 votes.

On Saturday, PTI Karachi president Khurram Sher Zaman presided over a meeting of the working committee formed for the PS-88 by-poll. PTI Karachi secretary-general Saeed Afridi, candidate Junejo and other leaders attended the meeting.

In that huddle, the PTI leaders were optimistic about winning the PS-88 seat and said that the party had been contesting against the Sindh government.

“Malir’s residents have been suffering badly for the past 13 years of the PPP’s rule,” Zaman told the meeting’s participants. He said that the PTI would help the people rid themselves of the PPP in the upcoming by-election.

The PTI has also intensified its efforts to muster support from its allied coalition parties in the Centre for the PS-88 by-poll.

A PTI delegation, headed by Firdous Shamim Naqvi, met leaders of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan and the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional to seek the party’s support for the PS-88 contest. However, leaders of both parties said that they would respond after they discussed the matters in meetings of their parties.

Analysts have, however, said that internal rifts within the party may have weakened the PTI’s position in the by-poll in the constituency.

Sami Memon, a Malir-based journalist, said that being a local and having influence in the rural areas falling in the constituency, Kalmati was considered a strong candidate that could have given a tough time to the PPP.

“Despite the fact that the ruling party in the province always wins by-polls, the rifts within the PTI’s ranks and sympathy votes for the PPP’s candidate because of his father’s death are the key challenges for the PTI in the by-poll,” Memon told The News. The PS-88 consists of a mix of urban and rural areas falling in District Council Malir.