28,626 people enter the voting ring

For the polls scheduled for February 8, 28,626 candidates have filed their nomination papers for 1,085 general and reserved seats in national and provincial assemblies around the nation.

In order to compete for 266 general seats in the National Assembly, at least 7,713 candidates—including 471 women—submitted their nominations, according to information released by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

For 141 NA seats in Punjab, 3,871 candidates—including 277 women—filed nomination documents; for the 61 NA seats in Sindh, 1,681 candidates—including 110 women—did the same.

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), there are up to 1,322 candidates (39 of whom are women) vying for 45 general seats in the National Assembly. In Balochistan, 631 nominees (of whom 12 are women) filed nomination papers for 16 NA seats. In the federal capital, nominations for three National Assembly seats were received from as many as 208 candidates, 26 of whom were women.

About 459 applicants submitted candidacy papers for the 60 seats in the National Assembly that are designated for women. There are 49 from Balochistan, 97 from KP, 195 from Punjab, and 118 from Sindh. Similarly, 150 nominations—ten of which were from women—were submitted in opposition to the 10 non-Muslim National Assembly seats that were reserved.

In total, 18,546 candidates—including 802 women—filed nominations for the five provincial assemblies’ 593 general seats.

4,37 of the 9,029 candidates that filed candidacy for the 297 general seats in the Punjab Assembly were women. Similarly, nominations for 4,265 candidates—205 of them were women—were received for 130 general seats in the Sindh Assembly.

In the KP Assembly, 3,464 candidates—115 of whom are women—have submitted nomination papers for 115 general seats. In the Balochistan Assembly, 1,788 candidates—45 of whom are women—are vying for 45 general seats.

In the four provincial legislatures, 132 reserved seats for women were up for nomination, with 1,366 candidates in total. These comprise 309 seats for 29 seats in the Sindh Assembly, 321 seats for 26 seats in the KP Assembly, 601 seats against 66 seats in the Punjab Assembly, and 134 seats against 11 seats in the Balochistan Assembly. Up to 393 candidates—32 of them were women—filed nominations for the 24 provincial assembly seats designated for minorities.

In the meantime, a critical stage that involves reviewing nomination papers began on Monday in order to eliminate individuals who are not qualified to run for office. The procedure will run through December 30. To assist the returning officers, the ECP has set up an online assistance center at its secretariat.

The facilitation center, supported by Nadra, NAB, FIA, FBR, and the SBP, will operate around-the-clock, according to ECP spokesman Haroon Shinwari.

These institutions will receive the candidate data from the returning officers and take the appropriate action. He clarified that the defaulting candidates should contact the relevant RO between December 25 and December 30 during the examination of nomination papers.

The ECP has emphasized that all federal and local government entities must get in touch with the returning officers as once in order to guarantee the recovery of outstanding debts from defaulters.

Returning officers are prohibited from posing any “irrelevant questions” by the Elections Act.

The section’s proviso states, “The returning officer shall not reject a nomination paper on the ground of any defect which is not of a substantial nature and may allow any such defect to be remedied forthwith. Provided that the rejection of a nomination paper shall not invalidate the nomination of a candidate by any other valid nomination paper.”