Imran Khan’s party claims victory in 170 seats, vows to form govt

In a major political development, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) has claimed that it has won 170 out of 265 National Assembly seats and is set to form an alliance with Majlis Wahdat-e-Muslimeen (MWM), Pakistan-based The Nation reported on Saturday.

This comes even though the counting for the polls is underway and the independent candidates mostly backed by the PTI, have clinched victory on 100 seats.

PTI leader Barrister Gohar Khan alleged that there was an attempt to “shape” the seats won by PTI into defeat. He also called on the party workers to protest outside the offices of Returning Officers (RO) tomorrow, where results got ‘delayed’, Dawn reported.

Speaking to reporters on Saturday, he claimed that the PTI has won 170 National Assembly seats out of the 265 where elections were held.

“We claim with great certitude that right now, the PTI has achieved a lead on 170 seats of the National Assembly,” Khan said. “Out of these, 94 are those that the ECP is admitting and has issued Form-47 (provisional results).”

Gohar Khan further said that 22 seats — including three of Islamabad, four of Sindh and the rest of Punjab — were those where, according to Form-45, the PTI had won but were “converted to a defeat”.

He alleged that there was an “apparent attempt to shape the winning seats of the PTI into defeats.”

Notably, Imran Khan was disqualified from contesting the elections due to criminal convictions. The electoral symbol of the PTI was also taken away by the ECP, in a ruling later backed by the Pakistan Supreme court. As a result, the PTI leaders and supporters contested as independent candidates, Dawn reported.

According to the unofficial provisional results reported by Geo News on 255 out of 265 seats show the independent candidates, mostly backed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) are leading on 100 seats, followed by PML-N and PPP at 73 and 54, respectively.

In the provisional results released by the Election Commission of Pakistan, the independents are leading on 91 seats, followed by PML-N and PPP at 71 and 54, respectively.

Barrister Gohar Ali Khan further said that people peacefully used their right to vote on February 8 on ex-premier Imran Khan’s call, and it was ECP’s “constitutional and legal responsibility” to declare polling results by 2 am the next day and to “explain the reasons if there was a delay.”

The PTI leader has also called on party workers and supporters to hold a protest on Sunday outside the offices of returning officers in constituencies where the poll results were being “withheld and delayed”.

“According to [Imran] Khan sahib’s instructions, the areas in which our results were withheld and delayed — we will share that list with you — and intentionally our majority is being converted…to turn a winning seat into a defeat,” Dawn quoted Gohar Khan as saying.

“This is why, the areas in which the results were not declared, we will hold protests tomorrow in those constituencies outside the relevant RO offices,” he added.

He further added that the protest would be peaceful, urging party workers and supporters to protest “according to the law”, adding that it was a constitutional right.

Meanwhile, in the Punjab Assembly, the PTI has claimed victory on 39 NA seats out of the 45 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Earlier, amid the Election Commission of Pakistan drawing flak over the delay in declaration of the results of the general elections, former PM and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan on Saturday released a ‘victory speech’ in his AI-enabled voice, saying that the ‘London Plan’ of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) supremo Nawaz Sharif failed with the massive turnout of voters on polling day, as he also claimed victory in the general elections.

However, heavy speculations have been raised on how free and fair the elections were in nature. The United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union have separately expressed concerns about Pakistan’s electoral process over violence, “lack of level playing field” and internet outages.