Asif Ali Zardari to take oath for second term as president today

Islamabad: Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari, who was elected as the 14th president of the country with a big margin, will take oath as the head of state on Sunday.

The oath-taking ceremony will take place at the Aiwan-e-Sadr in Islamabad at 4 pm on Sunday. Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa will administer the oath to the newly-elected president, Geo News reported.

The swearing-in ceremony will be attended by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, all three service chiefs, and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee (CJCSC) General Sahir Shamshad Mirza.

Moreover, governors of all four provinces, chief ministers and foreign diplomats will also participate in the ceremony.

Zardari, who was the joint candidate of the ruling alliance, was elected as the country’s president for the second time on Saturday after he defeated PTI-backed Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) candidate Mahmood Khan Achakzai by a huge margin.

The president-elect secured 411 electoral votes in parliament and all four provincial assemblies with the backing of allied parties mainly Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P).

Meanwhile, his rival, Achakzai bagged 181 votes as he was only able to secure the majority of votes in the PTI-backed SIC-dominated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly.

In the National Assembly, Zardari bagged 225 votes while Achakzai received 119 votes. Meanwhile, in the Sindh Assembly, he gained 53 votes while his opponent could only get three.

Zardari received 43 votes in the Punjab Assembly, eight in the KP Assembly and 47 in the Balochistan Assembly while his rival bagged 18, 41 and 0, respectively.

This is the second time Zardari has won the presidency. He earlier served as the 11th president of Pakistan from 2008 to 2013 and has been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan since August 2018.

Born in 1955, Zardari was brought up and educated in Karachi. He was married to Pakistan’s former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s daughter, Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated in December 2007.

Zardari will replace Dr Arif Alvi, who stayed in office for five more months despite completing his five-year term in September 2023.