PTI chief says would initiate campaign in support of direct elections for Senate
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan on Friday said that his party would neither vote for Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) nor Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) candidates for the post of Senate chairman.
“Both these parties have damaged democracy in the country,” Khan told a press conference. He said that both the parties were involved in politics for the sake of making money, adding that his candidates from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) did not allow the sale of their conscience and democracy and stood beside the party.
The PTI chairman also announced to initiate a campaign in the country in support of direct elections for the Upper House of Parliament.
“A similar situation was created in the US in 1913 and they decided that senators would be elected through direct polling,” the PTI chief said. A committee of legal experts has already been formed to look into the matter, he added.
He said that the PTI did not offer Senate tickets to anyone from outside the province.
“It’s not possible that MPAs take bribes and the party leaders don’t,” said the PTI chairman, alleging that the PPP bought at least four votes in the KP Senate elections.
“I need to know how Khanzada Khan got elected as a senator and Nadeem Afzal Chan bagged excessive votes?” he questioned, while praising the media for raising voice against horse-trading in the Senate elections.
Commenting over his earlier statements regarding bribe offer for a Senate seat, Khan said the person was from outside KP and he thought bribing was the only way to get to the power corridors.
Questioning the timing of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s trip to Saudi Arabia, he said that the PM was not interested in democracy, adding that Nawaz Sharif’s visit would prove useless.
Khan repeated his threat of resorting to street protests against alleged rigging in the general elections in 2013 if his party was not provided justice by the courts of law.
He said that he would soon meet the NADRA chairman to unveil facts about rigging in NA-122 Lahore constituency.