President Arif Alvi has completed his five-year term, but is not going to vacate office. The reason is that his successor can’t be elected. It reflects the importance of the office that the Constitution makes elaborate arrangements for the election of the President. The new President is supposed to be elected between 30 and 60 days before the end of his tenure, so that when his tenure ends, a President-elect is ready to take the oath of office. Originally to be elected by Parliament, but since 1985 to be elected by Parliament and the four provincial assemblies, the Constitution made provision for a situation where the National Assembly had been dissolved, saying that the President shall remain in office until a successor is elected, and adding that the President would be elected 30 days after the election of the National Assembly. The bar to an election is the non-existence of the National Assembly, and one or more of the provincial assemblies being also dissolved does not seem to act as a bar to the election.
However, all those assemblies are also dissolved, so the only component of the electoral college in existence is the Senate. The Senate itself is heading towards the retirement of half its members, which occurs in March, and which requires the provincial assemblies to be in existence at the time. The constitutional scheme is thus revealed as an interlocking sequence of elections, such that putting off one means that the whole edifice will collapse. Even the delay due to delimitations has knocked the constitutional timeframe out of kilter, with the elections to the National Assembly and all four provincial elections not being held within the 90 days stipulated.
President Alvi is the first elected President to go beyond his term since Fazal Elahi Chauhdry, whose term expired on 13 August 1978, but who continued a month extra till 16 September 1978, because a military coup had taken place a year before. President Alvi has hardly distinguished himself in office, particularly after his denials of assent to bills, sundry refusals to administer oath, after the removal of the Imran Khan government, showing that his primary loyalty has been to his party, of which he had been Secretary general until he was elected President. When elected, the end of his term was defined. However, now it is not, because the Election Commission of Pakistan said it would give the date for elections, but has still not done so, Until then, there is no knowing how long Dr Alvi will remain in office.
