ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has announced its candidate list for Karachi, with party chairperson Imran Khan contesting from NA-243.
Imran submitted his nomination papers. Rashid Godil, who recently jumped ship from the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, will submit his nomination papers from the same constituency.
Ali Haider Zaidi will contest the polls from NA-244. Faisal Vawda from NA-249. Imran Ismail from PS-111, Dr Arif Alvi from NA-247 and Haleem Adil Sheikh from PS-99. Dr Aamir Liaquat will be filing his nomination papers for NA-245.
The party’s Karachi president, Firdous Shamim Naqvi, spoke to Samaa News about the confusion over the party’s ticket allocation and said PTI’s parliamentary committee for Sindh has yet to have its second meeting when the final decisions will be made.
“You call it a mess but I call it a great success,” he said, referring to people criticising the party’s lack of coordination. Naqvi said they are fielding 63 candidates of the 600 who applied. “There’s a process here and if you don’t understand the process, that doesn’t make it a mess,” he added.
The parliamentary board will meet on Monday or Tuesday to finalise the candidate list, he said.
Imran is not making any decisions without considering the parliamentary boards’ recommendations, Naqvi said, despite the party chief’s earlier tweet in which he said he makes the final decision to award party tickets.
Samaa News Bureau Chief Faisal Shakeel explained that there are still three days left for nomination papers to be filed. “Political parties often submit multiple nomination forms for each candidate and later withdraw their papers once they have decided which constituency to contest the elections from,” he said.
Papers have been filed for both Imran and Godil from NA-243 and NA-256 but they have a few days to make any changes they want. He added that the earlier internal strife in the PTI has settled as workers have been promised tickets within the party.
APP