Asif Ali Zardari took oath as Pakistan's 14th President on March 10, a day after the veteran politician was overwhelmingly elected as the next head of country.
Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa administered the oath to Mr. Zardari, 68, at Aiwan-e-Sadr, the Presidential Palace. He will replace Dr Arif Alvi, who stayed in office for five more months despite completing his five-year term in September 2023.
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The swearing-in ceremony was attended by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, all three service chiefs, senior officials and diplomats.
Mr. Zardari, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) co-chairman, the joint candidate of the ruling alliance, was elected as the country’s president for the second time on March 9, after he defeated PTI-backed Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) candidate Mahmood Khan Achakzai by a huge margin.
He 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).
Mr. Achakzai bagged 181 votes as he secured the majority of votes in the PTI-backed SIC-dominated Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly.
Asif Ali Zardari, a veteran politician
This is the second time Mr. 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.
