Asif Ali Zardari Elected as 14th President of Pakistan, Bags the Office For Second Time

Islamabad: Veteran Pakistani politician Asif Ali Zardari was elected as the 14th President of Pakistan on Saturday, clinching the office for the second time in his career. The Co-Chairman of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) garnered a landslide victory with 411 votes from the electoral college, Geo News reported. With the Saturday victory, he became Pakistan's only civilian president to be elected for the second time. Zardari's candidature was backed by the newly elected ruling coalition. 

The 68-year-old Pakistani politician was competing against Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf-backed candidate Mahmood Khan Achakzai who only managed to get 181 votes. Achakzai managed to get the nomination for the office with the help of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC). During the Saturday voting session, the newly elected parliament of Pakistan rejected only one vote. However, it is interesting to note that 12 lawmakers of the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) did not take part in the election proceedings. Other parliamentarians who did not cast their votes include, one from the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), the Sunni Ittehad Council’s (SIC) senators Shibli Faraz, Ijaz Chaudhry, and Azam Swati, and Senator Muzaffar Hussain Shah from the Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA), Geo News reported. 

Zardari was elected by the electoral college of the newly-elected members of the National Assembly and the four provincial assemblies, as per the provisions of the Constitution. A businessman-turned-politician, Zardari is the husband of slain Pakistan prime minister Benazir Bhutto.  Zardari would now replace the incumbent Dr Arif Alvi, whose five-year term ended last year. 

Pak PM congratulates the new president

Wishes poured in from across the country after the results were announced on Saturday evening. Congratulating the president-elect on his success, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said that the elected members of all provincial and national legislative expressed their confidence in the new government by selecting their ruling coalition candidate. "Zardari's election as president is the continuity of democratic values," PM Shehbaz said, pledging on the ruling coalition’s behalf to work for the progress and prosperity of Pakistan.

 Meanwhile, Zardari's rival  Achakzai called it the “first of its kind of poll” and insisted that any sort of “horse-trading” was not witnessed. While speaking to the Pakistani reporters, Achakzai accepted his defeat and congratulated Zardari for his thundering victory. He reiterated that it was a “rare” poll and insisted that the elections were conducted in a “good environment. Calling it the “beginning of a new era” Achkzai expressed hopes for a "better Pakistan”.