Shafaqna Pakistan: More than two years after Pakistan’s February 8, 2024 general elections, candidates backed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have yet to secure a single victory in election tribunals, despite filing the majority of petitions challenging the results over alleged manipulation of Form 47.
According to data compiled by the Free and Fair Election Network, tribunals have decided 246 of the 374 election petitions filed, with 242 of those cases being dismissed.
PTI-backed independent candidates lodged approximately 55 percent of all petitions, including 86 related to National Assembly seats and 120 concerning Provincial Assembly constituencies. Many of these petitions alleged that provisional consolidated results recorded in Form 47 had been unlawfully altered from polling station results documented in Form 45. However, Fafen’s analysis indicates that none of these claims have resulted in a successful tribunal verdict.
The data shows that tribunals have largely dismissed PTI-linked petitions either on procedural grounds or due to insufficient evidence.
Explaining the outcomes, Fafen Manager Programmes Mudassir Rizvi said that 123 petitions were rejected on grounds of non-maintainability, including 44 relating to National Assembly constituencies and 79 concerning Provincial Assembly seats. He added that 26 petitions were dismissed after the allegations could not be substantiated during trial, while 12 were withdrawn, 16 were dismissed for non-prosecution, and two were rejected for miscellaneous reasons, including the death or resignation of the returned candidate.
He said the pace of disposal of petitions is rather slow, despite legal requirements that such petitions be decided within 180 days of their filing. But, he underlined, there is no provision in the law that empowers ECP to enforce this explicit deadline. So far, 246 petitions have been decided, of which 242 were dismissed. As many as 123 appeals have been filed in the Supreme Court to challenge the tribunal dismissals. Fafen has not yet been able to obtain copies of judgments in 63 dismissed petitions, including 16 related to the National Assembly constituencies and 47 to Provincial Assembly constituencies, and is therefore unable to determine the reasons for dismissal in those cases.
Of the 246 decided cases, only four were accepted — all in Balochistan provincial assembly constituencies and filed by JUI-P or National Party candidates, not PTI.
In contrast, PTI’s high-volume challenges, primarily targeting PMLN winners, have yielded nothing but dismissals.
Among the 242, the vast majority of dismissed petitions directly undermine PTI’s core narrative of systematic Form 47 rigging. Additional cases were withdrawn (12), dismissed for non-prosecution (16), or for miscellaneous reasons.
This PTI has long maintained that the elections were stolen through Result Management System discrepancies and Form 47 alterations. However, after full trials in a subset of cases, tribunals found the claims unsubstantiated. As Mudassir Rizvi highlighted, the data shows most rejections stemmed from procedural lapses or unproven assertions rather than validated rigging.
PTI and others have challenged 123 tribunal decisions in the Supreme Court, where only 18 have been ruled upon so far (three partially or fully accepted, 15 dismissed). With 105 appeals still pending, the party continues to pursue legal avenues, but the tribunal record so far represents a clear setback for its post-election strategy.
For PTI, the Fafen data shows that despite aggressive campaigning on “stolen mandate” and Form 47 controversies, the party has simply failed to prove its rigging claims in the vast majority of cases that reached adjudication.
Source: The News
