Sidelined by parties: Three UCs to field independent candidate for PK-90
ISLAMABAD, April 1: People in three remote union councils of upper Chitral have announced their decision to field an independent candidate for the provincial assembly seat (PK-90) after none of the political parties awarded tickets to the aspirants from the area.
Talking to this correspondent on the phone from Mastuj, Rakeen Khan, Mohammad Wali, Mohammad Rasool and others said former nazims of the Yarkhun, Mastuj and Laspur union councils had applied for the tickets of the PPP, PML-N and PTI but none of them was considered. Instead, the three parties nominated candidates from Booni and other far-off areas. They said in the past too political parties came to the area before elections but never came back after reaching assemblies. This creates lots of problems for us as the elected representatives never remain accessible to us nor they visit our areas situated in the northern part of the district, they said. Five people from the three union councils have filed nominations papers as independent candidates and now we have decided that we will field one of them for the provincial assembly seat, they added.
It may be noted that Mubarak Shah from Laspur, Mohammad Wazir Khan from Yarkhun, Shahzada Sikendar ul-Mulk and Aziz Nawaz from Mastuj have filed nomination papers as independent candidates. Shahzada Sikendar had applied for the APML ticket, Mr Wazir for the PPP and Mr Shah for the PTI.
The constituency of PK-90 has a total of 87,865 votes. The three union councils have 27,126 votes – Laspur 9,272, Mastuj 9,284 and Yarkhun UC 8,570.
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In the news item “Sidelined by parties: Three UCs to field independent candidate for PK-90” a highly pertinent issue has been raised. The larger Mastuj valley consisting of three Union Councils, perhapes with the largest landmass, from Parwak to Baroghil including Laspur valley, and having one-third of total votes in PK-90 (Chitral-II) has ruthlessly been ignored by the political parties. It is their strategic mistake in distribution of tickets as well, where such a large area and voters are being missed out.
The concern of people of the three Union Councils is genuine and supported. They may go ahead with their intentended decision of bringing an independent candidate as well, but it will have both negtive and positive outcomes. What is more important is for the political parties, particularly the PPP, still to rethink and field a candidate from this area. Booni and surrounding areas and Torkhow and Molkhow have otherwise become too congested with candidates of various parties, where the votes being distributed among candidates on various counts will not have decisive results. It will be voters from the three UCs of Mastuj that will paly vital role in deciding fate of the candidates.