PEC Elections 2024 Emerging alignments, fault lines

Each and every sitting be it a formal or informal, engineers across Pakistan has one topic in common.
Who will be the next chairman of Pakistan Engineering Council? Why should not this query be at the epicentre of engineers communication when the PEC Elections 2024 is just at the corner and all engineers’ groups have kicked off internal discussions focusing the elections.
Initial information gathered by ER suggests incumbent chairman, Engr. Najeeb Haroon supported by National Engineers—an alliance of National Engineers Welfare Organization, a section of contractors and a section of PEG, the organization Engr. Haroon once led—has decided to contest for the second term. ‘He would love to be nominated and supported by his allies, engineers close to him say. But would he be able to retain that support is not clear. Because, a section of engineers from his allies and close to NEWA chief wishes Engr. Abdul Qadir Shah to be the next chairman. Wishes apart, the interesting part is that not everyone in Engr. Shah’s group wants him to contest the office of the chairman.
Shah’s own group has another name too—Engr. Zahid Arif—which is in circulation for the office of chairman. Engr. Arif, a senior engineer hailing from KP and the one who merged his organization with Shah’s is now a divulged-candidate for the top post.
But Engr. Arif is not the last name on the list. Yet another senior engineer from Punjab, and running the office in the province, Engr. Niaz Akhtar is said be set at mind to contest for the post of the chairman. In sum, there are four candidates for the post from the alliance ruling at the moment.
Apart from National Engineers and the allies, engineers from Engr. Jawed Salim Qureshi’s camp has only one name in the sight—Engr. Qureshi. He has been active in recent months as the polls are drawing closer and thus has reorganized his camp—the Engineers Pakistan. Though his candidate in PEC Election 2021 did not fare well but he is said to have retained the amount of support mostly surrounded to him. Some engineers still mark him as a potential candidate for the forthcoming elections.
Besides National Engineers and the Engineers Pakistan, Engr. Waseem Nazir’s PEG is the third significant camp in the engineering community in Pakistan. Engr. Nazir attracted majority votes in Pakistan’s largest province of Pakistan but failed to win the majority for the office of the chairman. Engr. Nazir’s companions say he has also kicked off his group’s preparations for the campaign. Although, he has not announced for his candidature as yet but he is conceived to be the candidate for the top slot.
Among all three, PEG and the Engineers Pakistan have a kind of central command in terms of taking swift decisions for their candidates whereas the National Engineers is likely to undergo tougher bargains for picking up a consensus candidate. ‘In the process the alliance may go for another alignment too’, some engineers say.
Engr. Haroon’s aides argue he has run the council with a level of success and has taken care of his allies and engineers as a whole and thus he deserves to be picked up for the second term. But how Engr. Shah who had decided to contest for the top post much earlier and communicated to Engr. Najeeb Haroon would be convinced to be step back is something to be seen in the coming months.
Yet another interesting development to be seen would be the move of Engr. Zahid Arif’s supporters of whom some are as close to Shah as they are to Engr. Arif.
Not only that, but Engr. Niaz Akhtar’s candidature, if he is adamant to go along is the decision that he has not announced formally would be affecting alignments especially in Punajb which is the real battle group in the next elections. Engr. Akhtar had advantage of his deep relations in academia in Puniab, quite connected with engineering academicians in all four provinces in Pakistan.