Pakistan parliament to meet on Feb 29 as per law: Nawaz Sharif’s party leader

The constitutional requirement of summoning the maiden session of the elected parliament will be fulfilled as per law on February 29, a senior leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) party said on Sunday.
As per law, the first session of the newly elected assembly should be summoned within 21 days of the general election.
Since the polls were held on February 8, the parliament should meet by February 29.
PML-N senior leader Ishaq Dar said the parliament would meet on February 29 as per the Constitution.
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The law ministry has already sent a summary to the president with the proposal to summon the session as per law but Alvi, who is inclined towards the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party, has not approved it so far, creating fears that his refusal may create a constitutional crisis, a source told Geo News.
The source said the president has maintained that the lower house of the parliament is still incomplete due to the non-allocation of some reserved seats.
While the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has allocated reserved seats to political parties, it has not awarded reserved quota to the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) after the PTI-backed independent candidates joined their ranks.
The ECP said the matter of SIC reserved seats was “pending before the commission”.
The insider sources said the president had neither rejected nor accepted the summary and only communicated his verbal response.
Dar in his statement said the National Assembly speaker could summon the session on February 29 if the president did not do so under the Constitution.
The caretaker federal government has maintained that convening the National Assembly session within 21 days of the general elections was mandatory under Article 91 (2) of the Constitution.
Earlier this week, caretaker information minister Murtaza Solangi had said that the first session of the new National Assembly might be called on any date between February 22 and February 29.
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Responding to a query, Solangi mentioned that a simple majority was required to form a government, and the president after the 18th Constitutional Amendment did not have the power to invite a person or a party to form a government, he explained.
Meanwhile, the provincial assemblies of Punjab and Sindh have already convened their inaugural sessions, however, the assemblies of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa and Balochistan are expected to meet on February 28 for the first time.