ANP rejects reserved seats verdict, ‘horse-trading’

ISLAMABAD: ANP chief Aimal Wali Khan on Wednesday said the judgment given by the Supreme Court Constitutional Bench in the reserved seats case “does not reflect” the election results, as he also “rejected” any possibility of “horse-trading”.

Interestingly, he made these comments after a meeting with Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif in the federal capital. Although the official X account of PML-N shared an image of the two, but did not mention what was on the agenda for his visit.

Later, Aimal, the heir of the Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan’s legacy, in a series of posts expressed his serious reservations.

“The decision of reserve seats does not reflect the election results of February the 8th 2024,” he said, adding that it “further confirms that our parliament is jeopardised”.

However, the most interesting comments came in another post, where he said, “The ANP rejected, rejects and will reject any sort of Horse Trading.”

Aimal passed these comments about horse-trading on a day which saw Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur challenging the Centre to impose governor’s rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

With the number game improving in the favour of opposition in the provincial assembly, there has been rumours that a PTI faction may revolt against the party. However, none of the main leaders of the PML-N has even discussed the possibility in public.

‘REJECTED’ AND ‘WILL BE REJECTED’

Meanwhile, it seems that the ANP chief is in a mood to not accept everything associated with the setup ruling the country, given his persistent use of “reject” and “rejected” during the past two days.

On Tuesday, Aimal had said “Hybrid rejected”, “Hybrid PRO rejected” and “Hybrid PRO Max will be rejected”.

The term “hybrid” system or setup was added to the political vocabulary in Pakistan after Imran Khan came into power in 2018.

It was in use to criticise the arrangement under which Imran-led PTI governed the country. However, Defence Minister Khawaja Asif recently praised the current “hybrid model”, which started a new debate.

“This is a hybrid model. It’s not an ideal democratic government,” he had said. “So this arrangement, the hybrid arrangement, I think is doing wonders,” he added.