ISLAMABAD: An otherwise rational government proposal to hold the Senate elections through an open ballot to get rid of the role of money in the process has become a casualty of the current political strife.
The discord between the government and opposition has reached a stage where there is no common ground left for the two sides to sit together and arrive at a consensus on the implementation of a mutually beneficial proposition.
The opposition parties have turned down every government proposal -- in the form of amendments in the Constitution and the Elections Act 2017 -- to introduce an open vote in place of secret balloting. The opposition remains adamant that it will stand against these changes in parliament.
It is widely agreed that the opposition parties -- which obviously have fewer resources and powers at their disposal compared to the government to manipulate the Senate elections to increase their seats beyond their actual numerical strength in the electoral college -- will benefit more than the other side in an open ballot.
However, the reverse happened in March 2018 when the opposition succeeded in snatching some seats in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). The upset forced the ruling party to expel 20 of its provincial lawmakers, who were suspected to have voted against its directions. Everyone, including Prime Minister Imran Khan, knew that the money was used in securing the additional seats by the opposition parties.
The open ballot, if implemented, will ensure the exact number of seats to every parliamentary party as per its numerical strength in the electoral college. This would not be a bad outcome.
However, the opposition parties are strongly opposing the amendments in the Constitution and the Elections Act. The Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz and Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) are arguing that the PTI fears that a large number of its disgruntled provincial lawmakers would not support its candidates. They are ignoring the opposite outcome.
The Charter of Democracy (CoD), signed by Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto back on May 14, 2006 in London, had stated that to prevent corruption and floor-crossing, all votes for the Senate and indirect seats will be by open identifiable ballot. Those violating party discipline in the polls will stand disqualified by a letter from the parliamentary party leader to the concerned Speaker or the Senate chairman with a notice to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for notification purposes within 14 days of its receipt, failing which it will be deemed to have been notified on the expiry of that period. They thus wanted to make it binding on the ECP to notify the disqualification of defectors on the basis of the parliamentary leader’s letter without any proceedings whatsoever on it.
Prime Minister Imran Khan has referred more than once to this clause of the CoD to remind the PML-N and PPP that they had agreed in the past to an open ballot. But this has not changed the opposition’s mind as they persist with the rejection of the proposal.
The opposition parties have recently been bitten twice due to the clandestine defection of a number of their lawmakers, which brought about immense embarrassment to them. When they had moved a no-confidence motion against Senate Chairman Sadiq Sanjrani, over a dozen opposition legislators had crossed the floor in the secret vote, defeating the resolution. This was despite the fact that their sponsors were in a clear majority in the Upper House of Parliament. This outcome would not have been possible in an open ballot. The opposition had failed to identify the deserters.
The opposition had again suffered a setback last year in the secret balloting in a joint session of parliament, which had been convened to pass the laws specific to the Financial Action Task Force. The opposition parties were in a majority in the joint sitting but were defeated due to the floor-crossing of certain MPs, who were never named and shamed. Despite these setbacks, the opposition parties remain adamant on discarding the open ballot and supporting the secret vote.
If the Supreme Court advises an open vote on a reference which has been filed by the federal government, or if the Constitution and the Elections Act are amended by the parliament accordingly, the names of all the members of the electoral college would be printed on the ballot papers. It would thus become impossible for any lawmaker to vote against the direction of his party. In case they do so, he or she will be disqualified. Any defector who still dared to violate the party’s direction, would be easily identified from his ballot paper.
Imran Khan has long been calling for an open vote in the Senate polls. Such a mode of balloting would help undo corruption, he has argued. Since the Senate was recreated in 1985, massive sums of money have always been used in the exercise. Even candidates who had not belonged to any parliamentary party and did not have a single member in the electoral college openly aligned to them, had won seats in the past. Their victory had never left any doubt that mega bucks had changed hands in the process.
