Daska report

The Daska by-poll in February this year had created waves across the political spectrum as allegations of widespread fraud came up, complicated in particular by the mysterious disappearance of a large number of officers intended to count and bring in the votes soon after the polls closed. The ECP at the time had decided on a new election in Daska given the controversy over the results. The PML-N candidate emerged victorious in that election. Now the ECP has released yet another report detailing more about the Daska happenings and how the fraud was conducted. The ECP report speaks of senior administrative officials and police officials being instructed by those close to the chief minister of Punjab at the time to follow instructions that were given to them, to deliberately create law and order situation in the area, to slow down polling so that the lowest number of people possible could vote, and that the police later played a part in facilitating the disappearance of the election officials whose absence meant the votes could not be counted or announced in time.

There is little left to the imagination as far as this report goes. At the time of the Daska situation, the PTI had refused to accept the findings of the ECP and had gone into a battle with the organisation. Judging by its past behaviour, it seems highly unlikely that the ruling party will take this report seriously. Most likely, it will once again come out on the offensive against the Election Commission and declare it an unreliable body controlled by the opposition. This has serious implications given that the next general election is not far away. While the interference of district administrations in elections is well-established in our country, the findings of the Daska report go beyond the norm. The ECP report needs to be considered very seriously by the PTI at the highest levels, so that steps are taken to ensure there is no repetition of the behaviour we saw during that poll. It is also highly unlikely that all those actions took place without the knowledge of senior members of the party. The main purpose from this point on must be to prevent such action again in the future, and to give the ECP the full powers it needs to conduct a fair and free election, as is its mandate and as is the need of the people of Pakistan.