LAHORE    -    Against the backdrop of a possible delay in the conduct of elections to the provincial assemblies of Punjab and the KPK, President Arif Ali flew to Lahore on Thursday to have an im­

portant meeting with the PTI chairman Imran Khan. The PTI sources described the meet­ing as “very important” which took place in a situation when the federal government institu­tions have expressed their in­ability to provide the necessary assistance to the Election Com­mission to hold elections in the two provinces coupled with the likelihood of the PTI chairman’s disqualification in court cases. 

The federal government has attributed the delay in elec­tions to the incomplete process of delimitations, ongoing digi­tal census, and the anomaly of conducting provincial elections under the federal government and, later on, the holding of Na­tional Assembly elections [in October 2023] under the pro­vincial governments. The feder­al government representatives have maintained that elections to the national and provincial assemblies must be held un­der a caretaker set up under the constitution. 

Sources privy to the meeting said that the deliberation re­volved around the constitution­al role of the president in the given situation. Can the presi­dent give a date for the elections if the governors and the ECP fail to do so? Can the president par­don the PTI chief if he is disqual­ified by the court? And what would be the implications of the president’s proactive role in the present situation. These were the main issues discussed in the meeting between the president and the PTI chief, according to the sources who also said that a discussion on these points is al­ready underway in the party hi­erarchy as many insist that the president should play a proac­tive role to bail out the party in this difficult situation. 

Though the matter of giving a date for elections is pending for decision in the Lahore High Court, a section of opinion in the PTI is supporting the view that the president should play his constitutional role to make things happen in favor of the party. President Arif Ali has al­ready written a letter to the Election Commission to remind the election watchdog of its constitutional obligation to an­nounce the date for elections to the two provincial assemblies. 

Earlier in the day, the PTI’s sec­retary general Asad Umar also talked of the president’s power to appoint a date for the elections if the governor and the Election Commission fail to do so. 

“Primarily, it is the duty of the governor to appoint a date for elections and form a caretak­er cabinet. He formed the cab­inet but did not give a date for elections. If the governor fails to fulfil his constitutional respon­sibility, then the Election Com­mission should announce the date. But, if the ECP too does not comply, then the President of Pakistan has the power to call the elections under Election Act 2017. And he had already tak­en a step in this direction”, Asad Umar maintained while talking to the media outside Lahore High Court on Thursday. 

Clause 57 of the Election Act 2017 reads: “Notification of Elec­tion Programme.—(1) The Presi­dent shall announce the date or dates of the general elections af­ter consultation with the Com­mission”. Legal experts, however, believe that the president can­not invoke this particular clause because it is applicable only in a situation when the general elec­tions to the national assembly and the four provincial assem­blies are due after completion of their stipulated tenures or they all had been dissolved simultane­ously by the president and their respective governors on the ad­vice of the prime minister and the chief ministers. 

Also, according to sources, the president and the PTI chief dis­cussed the prospects of a presi­dential pardon to be availed in case the latter is disqualified to contest elections. PTI’s legal czar Babar Awan is reported­ly advising the party chief that the president should exercise this power to undo the move by his political opponent to get him disqualified through the courts.