Punjab, Sindh to hold LB polls in Nov, Dec

ISLAMABAD: The much-delayed local elections in Punjab and Sindh, being rescheduled due to floods, are going to be spread over two months in three phases.
The first phase will be organised in the first week of October while the third and last stage will come in end-November, an official told The News.
He said the polls are being scattered over an unprecedented long time so that foolproof security arrangements are put in place for every phase in view of the worst experience in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) where chaos and mayhem prevailed during the local elections that were on one day, May 30.
Never before have the local elections been spread over such a long time. Such polls had always been held the same day.
Some time back, the Supreme Court fixed September 26 as the simultaneous one-day polling in Punjab and Sindh, forcing the two provincial governments to hold the exercise that they have been deferring since long. The Punjab and Sindh had been reluctant for years to arrange the polls.
The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and the Sindh government have separately approached the apex court with the plea that they should be allowed to reschedule the local elections. The Punjab government also shares the same view and has conveyed it to the ECP.
The two provincial governments argue that since the district administration officials, who would serve as the district returning officers (DROs) and Assistant ROs in the polls, are busy in handling flood-related matters including relief measures, they can’t be spared for the election duty.
The administration officers are being assigned this role after the refusal of the judiciary to permit the subordinate judicial officials to do the election duty in the wake of grave allegations that were hurled at them by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI). The executive officers had also supervised the local polls in KP.
The ECP official said that major reasons to spread the elections in the Punjab and Sindh were the security measures required for the exercise as well as the printing of ballot papers.
He said that the reduction of ballots from six to two for each and every voter by the Punjab government has tremendously cut down the burden of having a huge number of voting papers.
Previously, the official said, some 300 million ballots were required only for Punjab whereas the requirement now will be around 120 million. This, he said, will enable the government printing presses to produce the requisite ballots in time. He added that these presses being too old did not have the capacity to print a huge quantity voting papers in a short time.
He said that it was almost impossible to make the suitable security arrangements for the same day polling in Punjab and Sindh as directed by the Supreme Court. There will be massive complaints and faux pas as witnessed in KP mainly because of failure of police and other law enforcement agencies to provide the needed protection and maintain law and order if the simultaneous polling is held in the two provinces, he said.
In addition, the official said, it was not possible to print such a huge number of ballot papers for Punjab and Sindh within the brief time that starts only after the unfolding the election schedule. However, this job will become easy and doable when the polls are staggered.
After receiving a great battering in the report of the inquiry commission, which looked into the charges of rigging in the 2013 general elections and rejected the accusations, for its lapses and shortcomings, the ECP is very conscious to go ahead with any electoral exercise only after making it a point that no occasion arises where it is again found lacking and is bashed. It earned immense flak for its performance in the previous parliamentary polls. The pleas filed by the ECP and the Sindh government in the apex court are yet to be heard.