The first session of the newly elected National Assembly of Pakistan will be held on Thursday. After much drama, the inaugural session of the National Assembly is finally going to be held. The Speaker and Deputy Speaker will be elected in the first session itself. Pakistan’s new prime minister and opposition leader will be elected. The process of how they will be selected has been highlighted by Pakistani media outlet Dawn.
Raja Pervez Ashraf convened the first session of the National Assembly on Wednesday. The session will be held on Thursday at 10 am.
According to the Constitution of Pakistan, a new National Assembly must be convened within 21 days of the general election. Accordingly, the session was convened on February 29.
Pakistan’s new Speaker, Deputy Speaker, Prime Minister and Leader of Opposition will be elected in the first session itself. Present Speaker Ashraf will preside at the beginning of this session. Because he will remain in office until the next Speaker is elected.
The newly elected members will take oath in the inaugural session of the National Assembly of Pakistan. 60 seats are reserved for women in the 336-member General Assembly. Besides, 10 seats are reserved for minorities.
Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has allotted 40 reserved seats for women to various political parties. These include 20 out of 32 seats in Punjab, two out of 10 seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 14 seats in Sindh and four in Balochistan.
Seven of the 10 seats reserved for minorities have been allotted. The ECP has not yet allocated reserved seats for minorities and women in the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC). Independent Jaiyara, backed by the imprisoned Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, joined the SIC.
Dawn’s report gives a brief overview of what the first session of the National Assembly might look like.
Election of Speaker and Deputy Speaker
Speaker Ashraf will preside over the first session. New Speaker and Deputy Speaker will be elected under his leadership.
The newly elected members will take oath at the beginning of the session. Each member will then be called upon to sign the register. Then time will be given to the Secretary of the National Assembly to submit the nomination papers of Speaker and Deputy Speaker. After the submission of nomination papers, the Speaker shall be elected by secret ballot as per Article 53 Clause (1) of the Constitution.
Election of Prime Minister
The schedule for the Prime Minister’s election will be announced after the newly elected Speaker and Deputy Speaker assume office. Basically, the Prime Minister is elected the day after the election of the Speaker.
Article 91 (3) of the Constitution states that after the election of the Speaker and Deputy Speaker, a Muslim member shall be elected Prime Minister without any debate.
The process of electing the Prime Minister is similar to electing the Speaker. Nomination papers should be submitted to the secretary first. Once the polling process begins, the doors of Parliament will be closed, so that no one can come and go until the election of the Prime Minister is over. Then open voting will begin under the supervision of the Speaker.
Election of Leader of Opposition
After the election of the Prime Minister, the Speaker will ask the members of the opposition party to submit the names of the candidates along with their signatures. They have to submit the name of the person they want to make leader. The speaker will inform about the date, time and place of submitting the name of the opposition leader after the election of the Prime Minister.
The announcement will be made soon after the election of the Prime Minister. But submitting this list may also take time.
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