Pak poll results being announced as 'delay' raises eyebrows; PTI-backed candidates win 3 KP seats

The Election Commission of Pakistan started announcing the 2024 poll results as parties expressed concern over a delay of more than 10 hours, but there was no clear picture till early hours of Friday on which party was leading the chart.Among the first unofficial results, the ECP announced that PTI-backed candidates have won three seats for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial assembly.The commission said that independent candidate Samiullah Khan won 18,888 votes according to results from 37.62 per cent of the polling stations for PK-76, the Dawn reported.As for PK-6, independent candidate Fazal Hakeem Khan took 25,330 votes.

The Election Commission of Pakistan started announcing the 2024 poll results as parties expressed concern over a delay of more than 10 hours, but there was no clear picture till early hours of Friday on which party was leading the chart.

Among the first unofficial results, the ECP announced that PTI-backed candidates have won three seats for the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provincial assembly.

The commission said that independent candidate Samiullah Khan won 18,888 votes according to results from 37.62 per cent of the polling stations for PK-76, the Dawn reported.

As for PK-6, independent candidate Fazal Hakeem Khan took 25,330 votes. The two are PTI-backed candidates.

''Samiullah Khan has been declared the winner from Peshawar's PK-76,'' ECP Special Secretary Zafar Iqbal said, according to the Dawn. ''The winner candidate in this (PK-6) is Fazal Hakeem Khan, an independent.'' The Dawn reported that PTI-backed independent candidate Ali Shah has bagged Swat's PK-4 constituency as per unofficial results from the Election Commission of Pakistan. He took 30,022 votes.

The polls closed Thursday evening and ballot counting began but there was no clear picture till about 3 am from the ECP about which party was leading.

As political parties complained about the delay and questioned the poll authority, the ECP directed all the provincial election commissioners and returning officers to announce the results within half an hour or else face strict action.

In a press release issued well past the midnight, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com, the electoral watchdog also said the statements being run by media channels regarding the ECP were not true.

Former prime minister Imran Khan, the founding-chairman of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), is behind bars and barred from contesting.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)