PM urges PTI leaders to begin preparations for LG polls at earliest in Punjab

Lahore: After PTI defeat in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) local government elections, Prime Minister (PM) Imran Khan urged the party workers and leaders to begin preparations for the local government (LG) polls in Punjab at earliest.

According to the details, the consultations between high level leadership and senior leaders were held under the chair of PM Imran Khan.

The meeting was attended by the senior representatives of PTI including CM Usman Buzdar, Punjab Governor Chaudhary Sarwar, Federal Minster Fawad Chaudhary, Shafqat Mehmood, Shahbaz Gill, Mehmoodur Rashid, and provincial health minister Yasmin Rashid.

The senior leadership of the party was asked to give away suggestions on how to improve party position. The premier said that he himself will take charge of the election strategy in the province.

He said the powers should transferred to grassroot level so that a strong local government system is established to address all issues faced by the public.

Imran Khan further maintained that the suggestions of the senior leadership of party must be respected. “The administrative and political zone must collaborate to bring a better strategy. The distribution process of Sehat Insaaf Cards in Punjab must be accelerated,” he further added.

On Monday, the PTI faced a major setback after the candidate fieled by Maulana Fazlur Rehman’s JUI won the seat for the post of Peshawar mayor in the local government elections held in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, unofficial and unverified results suggested.

PTI not only faced a setback in the mayoral elections but Tehreek Ulema-e-Islam also defeated the ruling party in the tehsil council election.

In the first phase of local body elections in KP, elections were to be held for 61 tehsil councils and five city councils; however, no elections were held in Baka Khel tehsil and Dera Ismail Khan city council.

According to the initial plan, polling was to be held for five city mayor seats, however, polling in Dera Ismail Khan was postponed following the murder of Awami National Party’s candidate. Hence, polling was only conducted in Marda, Peshawar, Kohat, and Bannu.

According to unofficial results, no PTI candidate managed to win in the above-mentioned cities.

In Mardan, ANP's Himayatullah Mayar bagged the seat with 56,458 votes while JUIF's Amanat Shah Haqqani was in second place with 49,938 votes, according to unofficial, unverified results of the polls.

Per unofficial results, in Kohat Sher Zaman of JUI won the mayor seat with 34,434 votes and independent candidate Shafiullah Jan was in second place with 25,793 votes.

In Peshawar, according to the unofficial and unverified results, JUI’s Zubair Ali won the race with 62,388 votes while PTI's Rizwan Bangash won the second spot with 50,659 votes.

Unofficial results of 515 out of 521 polling stations have been released for the mayor of Peshawar city council. While results of six polling stations have been withheld.

In Bannu JUI’s Irfanullah Durrani has been declared the winner with 59,844 votes and PTI's Iqbal Jadoon Khan was second with 47,398 votes, unofficial results suggest.