ISLAMABAD: President Arif Alvi sent back the advice of Caretaker Prime Minister Anwarul Haq regarding specific seats.
President Arif Alvi objected to the summary of convening the meeting of the National Assembly and said that first the reserved seats for women and minorities should be completed and then the meeting of the National Assembly will be called. The President sent the summary back to the Prime Minister House and the Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs.
Caretaker Prime Minister Anwar-ul-Haq Kakar had sent a summary to President Arif Alvi to convene a meeting of the National Assembly at 10 am on February 26.
The constitution mandates that the meeting must be convened within 21 days of the elections, and under the constitution, the meeting of the National Assembly must not be convened on February 29.
If the meeting of the National Assembly is held on February 29, then the schedule of the new Speaker will be released on the same day after the oath, then on March 1 the papers for the Speaker of the National Assembly will be submitted and on March 2 the Speaker of the National Assembly will be elected. The Deputy Speaker will also be elected on the same day.
Similarly, the process of submitting nomination papers for the election of the Prime Minister will take place on March 3, the election of the Prime Minister will be held in the National Assembly on March 4 and the election of the President will be conducted by the Election Commission of Pakistan on March 9. The meeting of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly will also have to be called on February 29.
It should be noted that Senator Ishaq Dar of Muslim League-N says that if the President does not call a meeting on the summary, the Speaker can constitutionally call the meeting himself on February 29.
