Who dissented in the ruling coalition?

ISLAMABAD: Questions are being asked among the top PTI circles regarding those MPs who did not cast vote for their Senate candidate Hafeez Sheikh who lost by 16 votes and Senate candidate Fozia Arshad, who though managed to win but secured 10 less votes than the reciprocal strength of the party and allies i.e. 180. By the same token, the former prime minister Yusuf Raza Gilani won by five votes, sticking a huge upset to the PTI government. He bagged nine more votes than expected as the opposition coalition’s strength in the National Assembly is 160.

It remains quite a puzzle that reciprocal to the strength of the PTI MPs in National Assembly and Provincial Assemblies, PTI's own Senate candidate Finance Minister Hafeez Shaikh secured 164 votes, securing 16 less votes to become a senator. Total votes polled for the general seat were 340, while seven votes were rejected. It has become quite a headache for the top PTI leadership to identify those 16 party members who dissented from the party line and refused to cast vote for Shaikh.

Similary, the former prime minister and PDM's joint candidate managed to secure 169 votes, nine more votes than the total number of total MPs with the opposition alliance. PTI's Fozia Arshad won from Islamabad's women seat by bagging 174 votes to defeat PML-N's Farzana Kausar who managed 161 votes. Here also 340 votes were polled in the women category, while five of them were rejected. Fauzia did win but got 10 votes less than expected from her party and allies.

In the entire scenario, one MNA from Daska could not cast vote as the ECP has declared its results null and void and directed a new election to be held there. Naveed Qamar, at one point, speculated that besides other votes that were rejected, three votes including that of Sheharyar Afridi got rejected because of overwriting, besides those of Prime Minister Imran Khan and Minister for Environment Zartaj Gul. However, nothing could be said with certainty regarding the PPP leader's claim except Sheheryar Afridi who had written to the ECP chairman to issue him another ballot.

While under the secret ballot, there is no definite way to trace who has dissented from the party line, the argument doing rounds among analysts is that there are certain PTI MPs disenchanted with PTI's candidate Hafeez Shaikh who has remained more of an alien to the party leaders and workers despite over two years in office. Furthermore, his chances to victory could not even be improved by PM Imran Khan personally leading his campaign. The crisis of confidence led to a major upset for the PTI on the iconical Islamabad seat. Already, there is a bitter divide between the elected and unelected ministers of the federal cabinet. The elected ones feel that they have to carry the baggage of 'bad performance' of the non-elected ministers and advisers sitting in the cabinet. Whatever the true reason might be, apart from the cancelled votes, the PTI was dealt a bloody nose by 16 own party leaders, who did not vote for the finance minister and perhaps went to vote for the PDM's Senate candidate Yusuf Raza Gillani.