ISLAMABAD: While the previous rigging allegations of Pakistan Tehrik Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan have backfired, his two latest points raised during Tuesday’s press conference have also been contradicted by the election data.
Khan raised two fresh points in the media briefing. First, he said a record number of votes (1.5 million) was rejected in the 2013 general elections. Second, he maintained that in 35 National Assembly constituencies, the margin of victory was lesser than the rejected votes which he termed ‘35 punctures’.
However, comparison of previous elections data shows that the percentage of rejected votes had risen in 2013 elections by only 0.4 percent as compared to the percentage of rejected votes in 2008 elections. Even in 2008 elections, the percentage of rejected votes also increased by 0.3 percent.
On average out of every 1,000 vote case in 2013 elections 32 were rejected while in 2008 elections the number of rejected votes out of every 1,000 was 28. In 2002 elections, out of every 1,000 votes, 25 were rejected.
According to data provided by Free and Fair Election Network (Fafen), a total of 46,417,482 votes were polled in May 2013 elections while 958,857 were rejected, a 3.25 percent rejection rate.
In 2008 elections, 34,637,522 votes were polled, and 958,857 were rejected, a 2.8 percent rejection rate. In 2002, the rejection rate was 2.5 percent as the total votes polled were 30,012,407 while number of rejected votes was 764,000.
In his presser, PTI chief referred to Fafen report to establish that results were manipulated in 35 constituencies terming it ‘35 punctures’ as number of rejected votes in these constituencies was higher than the margin of victory.
However, data shows that out of 35 National Assembly constituencies where the margin of victory was lesser than the rejected votes, PTI was runner up in only six seats.
Nawaz Sharif’s PML-N had won 12 such constituencies, but among those won by the ruling party, PTI was runner up in only two constituencies. It shows that PTI was winner in one of these constituencies while four such constituencies were won by Asif Zardari’s PPP and six by independent candidates.
Several other parties including Shujat Hussain’s PML-Q, Asfandyar Wali’s ANP, Sirajul Haq’s JI, Ahmed Noorani’s JUP, Mahmood Achakzai’s PMAP and Murtaza Jatoi’s NPP were also beneficiaries in some of these constituencies.
INTERNEWS
