ISLAMABAD: Members of the Senate Standing Committee on Parliamentary Affairs Monday cautioned against uploading of assets details of the legislators on the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) website, saying this could pose risk to their children.
They contended that the measure enables everyone to have access to the internet and “our children will become insecure”. Interestingly, this contention was supported by State Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan also.
In this connection, a meeting of the Senate committee was held here at the Parliament House, under the chairmanship of Taj Haider of the PPP to consider the Electoral Amendment Act Bill 2021, and the issue of granting voting rights to Pakistanis abroad.
On the meeting agenda was consideration of a bill further to amend the Elections Act, 2017, the Elections (Amendment) Bill, 2020, already passed by the National Assembly.
During the meeting, when it came to the details of the assets of the MPs, the committee members termed the process of uploading such details dangerous and suggested the repeal of Section 138.
PPP Senator Farooq H Naek said uploading details of assets could be a risk for their children. “Uploading details destroys members' privacy. Do you want people to come and kidnap my children?
“Every man has the internet. Everyone will see our assets and our children will be insecure,” he contended. To this, other members of the committee said that if anyone needs details, he can get them from the Election Commission. Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Ali Muhammad Khan supported the members' proposal and said that uploading details could worsen the situation.
He said that in the past, the people of FATA used to receive calls from Afghanistan, to which the chairman of the committee, Taj Haider, said that this was normal in Karachi. Earlier, the proposed amendments were considered that under the proposed amendment, the member of the Election Tribunal would be only a serving and a high court judge, while political parties would give preference to women as well as persons with disabilities and transgender people.
The committee was informed that under the proposed amendment, the election staff would be liable to imprisonment for three years, instead of six months, if the results were found to be manipulated.
Last month, despite the opposition's hasty warning against legislation, the National Assembly's Standing Committee had approved a bill to amend dozens of provisions of the Election Act 2017.
Proposed electoral reforms include nomination fees for candidates for National and provincial assemblies, delimitation, electoral rolls, open voting for Senate elections, voting rights of Pakistanis abroad, and the use of electronic voting machines in elections. Important proposed changes include further financial autonomy of the Election Commission of Pakistan (Section 11 (2)), delimitation on the basis of equal number of voters instead of population (Sections 17 and 20), delimitation of any person on the delimitation lists.
