Leader of Opposition in Senate: PPP, PTI make final campaign push

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has been left with no option but to swallow the bitter pill if the PPP proceeds with its candidate for the Leader of the Opposition, informed sources told Business Recorder. The PTI simply does not have the numbers or the negotiating skills of the PPP Chairman Asif Ali Zardari, background interviews with PPP leadership revealed. The PTI did not approach us with its proposed candidate for the Leader of the Opposition in Senate in return for supporting the Sanjani-Mandviwalla panel, senior PPP leaders told Business Recorder.
The total opposition in the 104 member Senate is 54 and the PPP has 20 senators against PTI's 13. The PPP requires support of 8 votes to get Sherry Rehman elected as the Leader of the Opposition. In a tweet, Sherry Rehman claimed, "We [PPP] demonstrated a clear majority of our signed number to Senate chairman. You need 27 [senators] in an opposition bench of 54. We declared 33". Talking to Business Recorder, Senator Shibli Faraz of PTI said that the PPP has a track record of 'ditching' its allies in matters that involve "position and money", and this is what it is doing in the nomination of the opposition leader.
However, Faraz acknowledged that his party should have taken an undertaking from the PPP prior to committing votes for its candidate in the deputy chairman's Senate election. "I kept telling my party leadership to bind the [PPP] to vote for our candidate as leader of the Opposition, but it is too late now, and Zardari has quietly played his winning card," he added.
A senior official at Senate Secretariat said the chairman Senate Muhammad Sadiq Sanjrani has received the nomination papers of Sherry Rehman as opposition leader in the Senate. He said that after receiving the nomination papers from PTI, the chairman Senate will notify the name of the opposition leader who enjoys the support of the majority of the opposition members. The PTI core committee which met here on Friday with party chairman Imran Khan, has declared Senator Azam Khan Swati as its candidate for the slot of opposition leader in Senate.