Administration faces great challenge in managing LG polls

ISLAMABAD: The administrative machinery, police and law enforcement agencies face a great challenge to manage better the limited local council elections in 20 districts of Punjab and Sindh and provide a peaceful environment to voters. The local polls have been spread over three phases mainly to enable the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), police, law enforcers and administrative machinery to make the exercise chaos-free.
This was done after a bitter experience in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) when the ECP and the provincial government were locked into a blame game after the massive faux pas and unprecedented mismanagement.
Although army troops had been deployed for election duty, the KP police and other agencies miserably failed to provide hassle-free atmosphere to the electorates to exercise their right.
The entire process was messed up as the local elections were held on the same day throughout KP although the ECP had suggested to the provincial government to scatter the polls in different phases.
To avert repeat of this kind of bungling, the ECP decided to hold the elections in Punjab and Sindh in three phases after consultation with the provincial governments.
In the first phase, polling will be held in 12 districts of Punjab and eight districts of Sindh on Saturday. The Punjab districts include Lahore, Faisalabad, Gujrat, Kasur, Okara, Vehari, Bahawalnagar, Chakwal, Pakpattan, Lodhran, Bhakkar and Nankana Saheb.
The Sindh districts are Khairpur, Larkana, Ghotki, Sukkur, Kamber-Shahdad Kot, Shikarpur, Jacobabad and Kashmore. In these areas, the entire administrative machinery will be totally busy with the process as the deputy coordination officers and their deputies are working as the District Returning Officers (DROs) and ROs after the refusal of the judiciary to spare the subordinate judges for the election duty in the wake of muck thrown on it by some losing political parties following the 2013 general elections.
In these Punjab and Sindh districts, the normal work of the administrative machinery has almost been at a standstill because of its preoccupation with the election duty.
People have complained that they have not been properly attended over the past couple of weeks.
The final phase of the local elections will be held on December 5, which will result in putting in place the local governments in Punjab and Sindh after a long time.
Successive governments had been dilly-dallying on holding local polls at an early day.
The present provincial administrations were forced by the Supreme Court to organise these elections without further delay.
The same ECP that has been under severe attack from certain political forces specifically the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) day in and day out is organising the local elections.
However, because of the intense pressure it has been subjected to, it is showing efficiency and diligence so that no fingers are pointed at it once again. The ECP has made it a point that the arrangements are spick and span and no party gets an opportunity to lambaste it.
However, the PTI is still unsatisfied and continues to hurl its usual allegations over the electoral body.