The Election Commission of Pakistan rejected on Monday the Sunni Ittehad Council’s petition seeking the allocation of reserved seats in the national and provincial assemblies, a major blow to the religio-political party which is now home to PTI backed candidates who won elections.
Islamabad: No Reserve Seats for SIC . In its reserved decision, the country’s top electoral authority said that the SIC was not entitled to reserved seats and decided not to allot seats to the party.
The Sunni Ittehad Council is a political alliance of Islamic political and Barelvi religious parties in Pakistan which represents followers of the school of Sunni Islam.
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The party was formed in 2009. The current chairman of the main ‘M’ faction is Sayyid Mahfooz Shah Sahib Mashadi and member parties of the Sunni Ittehad Council include the Aalmi Tanzeem Ahle Sunnat of Pir Afzal Qadri (of Gujrat) and Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan. The Jamiat Ulema-e-Pakistan (JUP) was founded by Mohammad Abdul Ghafoor Hazarvi. The breakaway ‘F’ faction that was established by Sahibzada Fazl Kareem and Haji Hanif Tayyab is now under the leadership of Hamid Raza.
After the 2024 election, the winning independent candidates supported by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf joined this party at Imran Khan‘s behest.
In December 2011, the Sunni Ittehad Council launched a countrywide “Difa-e-Pakistan campaign” to create public awareness against NATO attacks on Pakistan’s border military posts in Mohmand Agency, and decided to hold a “Condemn America Day” on the 23rd of that month. Those NATO attacks killed over two dozens Pakistani soldiers.
With Sunni Ittehad Council’s chairman, Sahibzada Fazal Kareem presiding, this decision was taken at an ‘All Parties Confereence’ of many parties of Ahle Sunnat school of thought.
The US government website Usaspending.gov shows that the Sunni Ittehad Council received $36,607 from Washington in 2009. Sunni Ittehad Council had organized anti-Taliban rallies in Pakistan in the past. But the council later demonstrated in support of Mumtaz Qadri who killed the liberal politician Salman Taseer for his criticism of anti-blasphemy laws in Pakistan. According to a Hudson Institute report, “A few days after the assassination, leading religious groups led a demonstration of over fifty thousand people in Karachi in support of the blasphemy law. During the rally, Qadri was lionized as a Muslim hero, while rally leaders sternly warned the crowds against mourning Taseer, whom they claimed had deviated from Islam.”
