The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) revealed on Friday that the eagerly awaited schedule for the general polls will be issued 54 days before the February 8 elections, as per Geo News.
The Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Sikandar Sultan Raja, said during an informal discussion with journalists that the election body is diligently working on completing all prerequisites for the upcoming polls.
In June, the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) government amended Section 57 of the Elections Act, empowering the ECP to set the general election date while defining a timeline of procedures from the announcement of the schedule to the polling day.
CEC Sikandar Sultan Raja assured that the election schedule, appointment of returning officers (ROs), and district returning officers (DROs) will be announced promptly. He mentioned that updated constituency lists had already been released, and the ECP was proactively handling election-related responsibilities ahead of schedule.
Despite concerns and speculations in political circles about potential delays in the already postponed polls, the ECP recently issued the final list of delimitation of constituencies for national and provincial assemblies, dismissing reports of possible delays.
According to the notification issued by the ECP, the National Assembly (NA) has a total of 266 seats; 60 seats are reserved for women and 10 for religious minorities.
Balochistan has a total of 20 NA seats, including 16 general and four reserved seats for women; Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has 45 general NA seats and 10 reserved seats for women; Sindh has a total of 75 NA seats, of which 61 are general and the remaining 14 are reserved for women.
On the other hand, considering population, Punjab is a big province, and it has 141 NA seats, of which 32 are reserved for women. The federal capital has three general NA seats, with no reserved seat for women.
Article 106 pertains to the constituencies of the four provincial legislatures. According to this article, Balochistan comprises 51 general seats, with 11 reserved for women and three for non-Muslims, making a total of 65 seats.
In the case of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, there are 115 general seats, along with 26 reserved for women and four for non-Muslims, bringing the total number of seats in the legislature to 145.
