Tax evasion, debt default, crime, dual nationality no more hurdle to be MP

ISLAMABAD: Good news for aspiring and incumbent public representatives and equally bad news for public: no matter one is tax evader, loan defaulter, facing criminal charges or dual national, none has to be declared in election nomination papers.

As many as 19 declarations on oath which were mandatory for a candidate in the past have been deleted in the newly-passed law, Elections Act 2017. With this change in oath, a path has been paved to avert disqualification during the scrutiny of nomination papers or after becoming a lawmaker.

Several lawmakers have been disqualified in the past for mis-declaration of assets, loan default, educational qualification and dual citizenship. Worse still, there is NRO among all the parliamentary parties as the relevant clause in election law has been deleted with a rare consensus on the issue of common interest.

Even the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), which went to the Supreme Court after this Act later was amended to allow a disqualified individual to head a political party, didn’t object when declaration and oath of the election candidate was changed. PTI’s three MNAs were part of Parliamentary Committee on Election Reforms (PCER) headed by Senator Ishaq Dar.

Similarly, Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) raised objections after the changes in oath relating the finality of Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him), which led to the reversal in amendment, no lawmaker protested over the clean chit granted to election candidates. It didn’t catch the media’s attention either as the law was passed in October 2017 without any criticism over this controversial waiver.

The election nomination papers were previously designed by the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) as they were covered by the ECP rules. The new law has subjected any change in the Elections Act 2017 to the approval of parliament.

This entire exercise had gone unnoticed had it been not highlighted in an article late Tuesday by Ahmed Bilal Mehboob, president of Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (Pildat).

“Transparency regarding those seeking public office is one of the basic requirements for the democratic system to work satisfactorily. Any effort to curtail the level of transparency will compromise the basic principles of democracy. Unfortunately, the deletion of these important declarations has done just that -- compromised the fundamental principle of democracy by curtailing the transparency about the candidates running for public office,” he wrote.

It is somewhat surprising, Ahmed continued, that such significant curtailment of transparency was allowed by the parliament even while almost all political parties were represented in the Parliamentary Committee on Electoral Reforms and its sub-committee through their ablest legislators. Five notes of reiteration or dissent were submitted by the members of the PCER on behalf of their respective political parties at the time of submission of the final report to the parliament but none of these notes relates to the declarations deleted from the nomination form, he pointed out.

Following declarations have been deleted from the oath the election candidate had to make in previous elections:

1) Declaration on outstanding loans from any bank, financial institution, cooperative society or corporate body in the candidate’s name or in the name of his/her spouse or any dependents.

2) Declaration on default in payment of government dues or utility charges.

3) List containing names of spouse(s) and dependents.

4) Declaration about companies owned by the candidate or his/her spouse and dependents.

5) Declaration of pending cases of criminal offences.

6) Declaration of education qualification.

7) Declaration of present occupation.

8) National tax number.

9) Declaration of income tax paid during the last three years (along with total income and source of income).

10) Declaration of travel abroad during last three years.

11) Declaration of agriculture income tax paid (along with land holding and agriculture income).

12) Declaration of important contribution made by the candidate for the benefit of candidate’s constituency if elected previously.

13) Declaration of sum paid to any political party that awarded the ticket to candidate.

14) Declaration of sum received from any political party that awarded the ticket.

15) Declaration to abide by the code of conduct issued by the ECP.

16) Declaration of net assets of current financial year and previous year; and difference in the net assets (only current financial year’s value of assets and liabilities had to be provided).

17) Declaration of foreign passport detail from statement of assets.

18) Declaration of personal expenditure detail from statement of liabilities.

19) Statement on oath that the candidate is a citizen of Pakistan and does not carry any other nationality.