Balochistan Assembly seeks polls delay

QUETTA: The Balochistan Assembly on Wednesday approved a resolution demanding one-month delay in the upcoming general elections.

The resolution, submitted by Balochistan Home Minister Mir Sarfaraz Bugti, demanded that the elections should be held in August, instead of July this year, because “a majority of the public wants to go on Haj for which [many] would be travelling to Saudi Arabia in July” and hence, they would be unable to vote in the elections.

The resolution also expressed concern that the province receives monsoon downpours during the month of July, due to which many districts face flooding and a lot of residents are forced to move to other areas for shelter. Such a situation would deprive these people of the opportunity to vote, it states.

Keeping these concerns in mind, the provincial government is therefore requested to ask the federal government to instead hold the elections in the last week of August so that everyone can exercise their constitutional right to vote, the resolution adds.

The National Party (NP) and Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) opposed the resolution. Meanwhile, a delegation of the Bahadurabad faction of the MQM held a meeting with the Sindh election commissioner.

The Bahadurabad faction submitted a petition with the election commission, requesting it to delay delimitation of constituencies, until actual results of the population census are announced.

Speaking to newsmen after the meeting, Faisal Subzwari said the conduct of transparent elections was not possible without ensuring transparency of census. He said that if their petition was not approved, they would approach the courts.

MQM-P leader Farooq Sattar warned that his party could boycott the forthcoming elections, if its reservations were not addressed. Speaking to the media here, Sattar, who heads the PIB faction of the MQM-P, lamented that the election commission did not heed to their reservations over delimitation of constituencies, while the party had also not been handed over control of its offices.

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) said that general elections would be held on time. An ECP spokesperson said the Islamabad High Court’s decision to declare delimitation of some constituencies as void had not been received.

However, he maintained that the preparations for the conduct of the nation-wide electoral exercise were complete and the election schedule would also be issued within the stipulated time and elections would be held on time and there was no chance of a delay.

To finalise a mechanism for timely completion of scrutiny of nomination papers of candidates, an important meeting was held here at the ECP. It was attended by representatives from the NAB, SBP, FIA, Nadra and FBR. These officials had a meeting with the IT Wing of the Election Commission for online scrutiny of candidates.

These institutions shared the names of their focal persons with the Election Commission, who will be contacted as and when needed with regard to scrutiny-related matters. Meanwhile, the ECP called on the caretaker prime minister, chief ministers and ministers to submit details of their assets and liabilities and those of their spouses and dependents.

Through a statement, the ECP has drawn the attention of caretaker prime minister, caretaker chief ministers and caretaker ministers and members of caretaker governments to the Section 230 (3) of the Elections Act, 2017.

The law makes it binding on the caretaker prime minister, chief ministers and ministers to file assets and liabilities details of their own, their spouses and dependents to the ECP within three days after assuming the respective offices.