Senate calls for ‘transparent, credible’ elections

ISLAMABAD: Leader of the House Muhammad Ishaq Dar and Leader of the Opposition Dr Shahzad Waseem in the Senate Friday strongly called for transparency and credibility in the upcoming elections and for ensuring the results must be acceptable to all political parties.

On a point of public importance, the Leader of the Opposition underlined the need for moving forward with a new mindset and a spirit of reconciliation, providing ample opportunities for the youth to reach the legislatures. Shahzad Waseem welcomed the consensus announcement of the election date but said that according to the Constitution, polls must have been held within 90 days. He said the credibility of elections would be as important as the date of polls so that no one could question the transparency of elections, ensuring equal opportunities to all.

Waseem said that there was also a need to learn lessons from the bitter experiments of the past and tragedies and recalled the 1971 elections followed by an era of dictatorship for 11 years. “It is time for 57.1 million youth to announce their decision through the ballot. Political parties are urged to give tickets to youth to reach the legislatures and provide guidance. The present-day challenges cannot be tackled by using tried and tested old methods,” he said and added there was a need to move towards a bright future in a spirit of reconciliation by learning from the bitter past.

Ishaq Dar, who is also a former finance minister, said the Constitution says that elections should be held in 90 days, but the remaining provisions of the Constitution cannot be ignored either. He explained that once the Council of Common Interests approved the new census, the Election Commission had no other choice but to carry out delimitation accordingly. He also referred to the resolution adopted by the then National Assembly in this context.

“We also wanted the election to be held in 90 days and Rs5 billion were allocated for the election in the first budget. Election Commission needed Rs54 billion for the elections, so we decided to give Rs46 billion to it. For Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa elections, an additional Rs16 billion were needed after their assemblies were dissolved.”

Dar also agreed with the Leader of the Opposition that all should get equal opportunities but complained his party was not provided with a level playing field in the 2002, 2008, 2013 and 2018 elections. He said the 35 punctures issue was false and they had issued a white paper.

About the economic issues, Dar said that the aim of some forces was to force Pakistan to default. “A gentleman of the previous government, who admitted laying down economic landmine, should not be doing politics anymore,” he said.

Referring to some key factors, including the decisions agreed upon with IMF by the government (prior to the PDM regime), and then reversing them, he said it placed the country at great risk, so policies had to be adopted to ensure Pakistan’s survival during his stint as the finance minister. “Our government took all steps to release the budget to Election Commission, but if you derailed the IMF programme, then you cannot blame the PDM,” he said, addressing the Leader of the Opposition.

PTI’s Mohsin Aziz said all were responsible for the challenges the country was facing today and no single party could be blamed for this. He praised the caretaker government for stabilizing the economy and currency, sending back refugees and taking steps to curb gas and electricity theft, as well as controlling smuggling. As PPP Senator Sherry Rehman rose and could barely say something, a lack of quorum was pointed out. The count was made and the House was found short of quorum, forcing the chairman to suspend proceedings and ask for ringing bells for two minutes. However, even after that, the House was not found in quorum. Later, the session was adjourned till Monday afternoon.