No delay in polls: PM

ISLAMABAD: Caretaker Prime Minister Nasirul Mulk on Friday said elections will be held on time and all-out cooperation will be extended to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for holding free, fair and transparent polls.

“You can imagine and say that if the polls are not held on July 25, I wouldn’t be here in the office on the following day,” the caretaker prime minister told The News after taking oath of his office at the Presidency.

President Mamnoon Hussain and outgoing premier Shahid Khaqan Abbasi were also present beside the caretaker prime minister during the chat. “Please don’t ask difficult and ‘out of syllabus’ questions,” Shahid Khaqan Abbasi quipped in lighter vein.

The PM told journalists to note that elections will be held on time. The caretaker prime minister was in pensive disposition but his foreigner spouse, who had been a follower of Buddha, kept smiling while sitting among the guests throughout the oath-taking ceremony. Nasirul Mulk, who has served as chief justice and chief election commissioner (CEC) of the country, earlier kept assuring his interlocutors in the function that he would do his best for holding the elections transparently. He said the administration would provide the maximum assistance to the ECP for holding the polls.

Interestingly, the PTI chief Imran Khan was also invited for the oath-taking ceremony as the guest of the caretaker prime minister, but he didn’t turn up. Dr Farooq Sattar of the MQM-Pakistan was the only head of any party who opted to grace the ceremony. The Senate Chairman, Sadiq Sanjrani, Leader of the House in Senate Raja Zafarul Haq, services chiefs, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Justice (retd) Sardar Raza Khan, Professor Ahsan Iqbal, Engineer Amir Muqam, NSA Lt Gen (retd) Nasser Khan Janjua, former senator Nehal Hashmi, Sartaj Aziz, Attorney General Ashtar Ausaf Ali, Federal OmbudsmanAli, Federal Ombudsman Syed Tahir Shahbaz, Sheikh Luqman Ali Afzal, Anusha Rehman and Professor Irfan Siddiqui were among the conspicuous guests.

After taking oath, the caretaker premier was presented with a guard of honour at the PM House. Mulk is the seventh caretaker prime minister of Pakistan. Former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi was also given farewell with a guard of honour.

US ambassador David Hale told this correspondent that the oath taking is a public ceremony and one should hope that democracy will flourish in Pakistan. Indian High Commissioner Ajay Absaria said efforts are yielding results by reversing the negative trend in the ties between Pakistan and India.

Sardar Raza Khan was of the view that the elections will be held as per announcement made already. He reminded that the election laws in Pakistan are more stringent than in India. He said the Election Commission has the authority to proceed in contempt cases, while it is not available to the Indian election rules. While quoting a former Indian chief election commissioner, he said that Indian judiciary and media provide outright support to the election authorities, while in Pakistan, it is lacking.

Sartaj Aziz, who was greeted by the fellow guests on legislation about Fata and Pata, said Zulfikar Ali Bhutto had undertaken the exercise way back in 1976 to merge the areas in the then NWFP, currently KP province, but he was frightened by the impression that it would become even bigger unit than Sindh. He said this fear forced him to drag his feet. The ambassadors/high commissioners of China, Russia, UK, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Qatar, Japan, Iran, and France also attended the ceremony.

Meanwhile, Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Mian Saqib Nisar vowed to ensure that there is no delay in the upcoming general elections. “General elections will be held on July 25 and we will not allow any delay no matter what,” the chief justice said during a hearing in the Supreme Court’s Lahore Registry on a petition against the Election Commission code of conduct for the upcoming general elections.

The petitioner stated that ECP’s code of conduct issued for 2018 general elections is against “agreed upon rules and regulations”. “The court should declare the code of conduct null and void,” the petition stated.

Issuing a notice on the matter, the court summoned a reply from the chief election commissioner to be submitted by June 4. The ECP on Thursday released code of conduct for election observers, polling staff and security officials who will be deployed during the general elections.