Mardan - The ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) despite having nine reserved seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly and three members in the National Assembly along with one reserved seat and three senators, has suffered the worst defeat in the Local Bodies (LG) election in Mardan district. 

Among the five tehsils of Mardan, the PTI remained in competition only in tehsil Rustam. It is worth to mention that Federal Minister Ali Mohammad Khan and KP Senior Minister Atif Khan belong to Mardan district. 

The PTI has suffered the worst defeat at the hands of JUI-F and ANP in the local government elections. JUI-F won three tehsil and ANP won two tehsils including Mardan mayorship. 

According to observers, there are many reasons besides inflation behind PTI’s defeat including poor planning, lack of organisational structure on district, tehsil and union council level and the issue of tickets. The PTI carried out development works worth billions of rupees in Mardan during its eight years tenure but despite this it could not win the trust and confidence of the masses of Mardan and suffered the worst defeats in LG polls. 

Observers say besides inflation many reasons including poor planning, lack of organisational structure 
behind the ruling party’s defeat

Sources within party said that PTI MNA and MNA managed to carry out development work at local level through influential people who are not affiliated with the party and these influential people contested election in the NCs and VCs as independent candidates. However, these independent candidates were succeeded on some of the NCs and VCs, but they failed to convince voters for tehsil candidates. 

Atif Khan had defeated his opponents in 2018 elections by a large margin, but in the local body election, the PTI suffered a heavy defeat in all polling stations. Atif Khan lost his own polling station. 

Similarly, Federal Minister Ali Mohammad and all other lawmakers of PTI lost their own constituencies. The sources said that due to grouping and differences within party the PTI faced defeat in LG elections. They said that on district, tehsil and village council level there was no proper organisation of the party to support the party candidate on NCs and VCs level. 

The sources claimed that Atif Khan allotted tickets to his favourites and supporters without consultation of PTI local office-bearers and lawmakers. Only 13 days before the election PTI allotted tickets to their candidate due to which they couldn’t launch their campaign on time. The PTI workers urged Prime Minister Imran Khan to take strict action in this connection.  

It may be noted that in the 2018 general election PTI gained 215,595 votes in Mardan district, ANP gained 144,728 votes and JUI-F gained 74,679 votes however in local government election JUI-F has increased its vote bank to 160,579 while PTI decreased to 94,285 and ANP also decreased its vote to 123,227.