Pakistan’s vacant parliamentary seats have big human rights repercussions

Pakistan doesn’t enjoy an enviable status in international rankings on the treatment of women and minorities. For example, in 2024, in the Gender Gap Report released by the World Economic Forum, Pakistan ranks 145th out of 146 countries. Similarly, national and international agencies monitoring treatment meted out to religious minorities also paint a rather bleak picture.

If one asks what’s one of the most burning constitutional and political issues being debated in parliament and the judiciary in Pakistan these days, the answer invariably points to the controversy on allocation of seats reserved for women and non-Muslims in the national and provincial assemblies. 

Although women and non-Muslims are free to contest election on the general seats like anybody else, the Pakistani constitution provides that about 18 percent and 3 percent of the total seats in the assemblies be reserved for women and non-Muslims respectively, in view of the gross under representation the two segments of the population in the assemblies.

Pakistani state institutions including parliament and judiciary should promptly find a resolution to the issue from a human rights perspective.

- Ahmed Bilal Mehboob

This quota for women and non-Muslim seats is distributed among political parties in each assembly in proportion to the seats won by them in general election. The general election to the national and four provincial assemblies took place on February 8 this year but the process of allocating reserved seats to the political parties could not be completed even after six months.

At issue is the allocation of reserved seats to PTI whose candidates could not contest the February election under a common party symbol due to legal objections of the Election Commission and endorsed by the Peshawar High Court. As a result, the PTI could not qualify for the reserved seats as it had no member of its own in the assemblies. These seats can only be allocated to the political parties represented in the assemblies and not the group of independent members. Although PTI-supported elected members joined a friendly political party called Sunni Ittihad Council (SIC) in order to secure the reserved seats, the ECP foiled the SIC bid to secure the reserved seats by declaring that since SIC did not contest polls, it is not qualified for allocation of reserved seats. SIC, as a proxy of PTI, could have secured about 77 seats in the national and three provincial assemblies out of a total 226 reserved seats. After declaring that SIC is not qualified for these seats, the Election Commission distributed 77 seats among other qualified parties present in the assemblies.

A three-member bench of the Supreme Court headed by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah suspended the Peshawar High Court judgment on 6th May which meant that the additional reserved seats given mostly to the ruling coalition were withdrawn.

A 13-member full Supreme Court later heard the SIC appeal and its 8-member majority issued a short order on 12th July which effectively allocated the disputed reserved seats to PTI. The matter should have ended here but there are three key challenges still facing the implementation of the order.

First, the 8-member majority judges have to reply to the queries of the Election Commission which it raised regarding the implementation of short order.

Second, the Supreme Court majority short order was supposed to be followed by detailed reasons which has not happened so far and it, along with the hearing of the review petitions filed by PML-N and ECP, may be delayed till September, after the 2-month vacation of superior court judges. In the meantime, two judges who had given minority decision have released detailed reasons for not agreeing with the majority. They have raised serious constitutional questions about the majority order.

Third, a controversial Elections (Second Amendment) Act has recently been passed by the parliament which effectively neutralized the SC majority order. In these circumstances, it is very difficult to predict when the remaining vacant reserved seats may be filled.

While the decision on the reserved seats for women and non-Muslim minorities is in the eye of the political and judicial storm, one third of the total reserved seats for women and non-Muslims continue to be vacant for the last six months because of the political and legal wrangling. Irrespective of the political affiliation of the persons who will eventually fill these seats, the two marginalized groups remain without a substantial part of their representatives in the national and provincial assemblies.

It is likely that Pakistan will face further criticism from local and global entities monitoring treatment of women and minorities. Pakistani state institutions including parliament and judiciary should promptly find a resolution of the issue from a human rights perspective and the seats reserved for women and minorities should be completely filled in the legislatures.  

The writer is the president of Pakistan-based think tank, PILDAT; Tweets at @ABMPildat