KABUL on Sunday elected Hamayon Hamayon as the lower house deputy speaker and ten-panel heads, with the ballots for electing the 2nd deputy speaker and secretary going to a second round.
Leaders of the two houses of parliament are elected for one legislative term. The current Wolesi Jirga speaker is Abdul Rauf Ibrahimi and Meshrano Jirga (Senate) chairman is Fazal Hadi Muslimyar.
On Saturday, the Wolesi Jirga voted to elect its administrative board members. However, none, except Irfanullah Irfan, the nominee for the deputy secretary, were able to reach the threshold. Hamayon and Mohammad Nazir Ahmadzai, who vied for the first deputy speaker slot, secured most of the votes.
The two top candidates, Hamayon and Ahmadzai, ran again today (Sunday) when Obaidullah Kalimzai and Mohammad Abdah fielded themselves for the second deputy speaker slot and Mirdad Khan Najrai and Mohammad Yousuf Sabir for the secretary.
As a result, Hamayon gathering 110 votes from the house was elected as the first deputy speaker. However, Kalimzai, Abdah, Najrabi and Sabir secured 73, 90, 104, 59 votes respectively, failing to clinch the slots.
Speaker Ibrahimi said 216 lawmakers were present in today’s voting and each nominee was required 109 votes to win. He said new nominees would be introduced during the third round the ballot.
Last yearHamayon Hamayon was serving as first deputy speaker, Mohammad Nazir Ahmadzai as second deputy speaker, Abdul Qadar Zazai as secretary and Irfanullah Irfan as deputy secretary of the lower house.
Irfanullah Irfan, deputy secretary of the house, said Shir Ali Ahmdzai was elected as head of nomads affairs commission, Qais Hassan as head of communications, Iqbal Safi as head of internal security, Nisar Ahmad Ghoryani as defensive affairs and Mir Rahman Rahmani as economy commissions of the house.
He said Kamal Nasar Ausuli was elected as head of education and youths commission. Heads for four commissions of the lower house are yet to be elected.
The Meshrano Jirga or upper house elected its administrative board on March 7. The upper house re-elected Mohammad Alam Ezdyar as first deputy chairman, Mohammad Asif Seddiqi as second deputy chairman, Taib Atta as secretary and Mohamamd Faisal Samay as deputy secretary.
mds/ma
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