PDM leaders start consultations for upcoming Senate elections

LAHORE: The Pakistan Democratic Alliance (PDM) leaders have started consultations for the upcoming Senate elections which is likely to be held in February this year, ARY News reported on Thursday.

Sources said that PDM leaders are mulling over fielding joint candidates for the Senate polls. The opposition leaders have started consultations to field joint candidates in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and Balochistan assemblies.

Sources closer to Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz said that the PDM parties will be convinced to field joint candidates besides appeasing Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) to support PML-N in Punjab.

A consultation session will be summoned soon to discuss the strategy to field joint candidates of the opposition parties, PML-N sources said.

Read: ECP opposes Senate polls through open ballot in reply to SC

It is pertinent to mention here that the opposition alliance is currently possessing 22 seats in Balochistan Assembly and 41 lawmakers in KP Assembly.

Earlier in December last year, PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had said that Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) will prepare a joint strategy for upcoming Senate elections.

He had made the remarks in a telephone conversation with Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz Vice-President Maryam Nawaz. Both of them had agreed to take all the PDM member parties into confidence over Senate polls.

On December 15, the federal government had decided to hold Senate elections in February rather than in March.