KARACHI: The government in Pakistan’s southern Sindh province on Monday welcomed a decision by the country’s election oversight body to dismiss a plea by the Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) party to delay local polls in Karachi, which are scheduled to be held on January 15.
Local government elections in Karachi were earlier scheduled for July 24. But last summer’s floods and inadequate arrangements to manage the polls caused several delays in their conduct. In November, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) parties moved the Sindh High Court (SHC) to ensure polls were conducted without further delays.
A two-member bench of the court, comprising SHC Chief justice Ahmed Ali M. Shaikh and Justice Yousuf Ali Sayeed, directed the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to announce the date for the local government elections. The ECP consequently announced 15 January as the election day. The MQM-P challenged the decision citing old electoral rolls, while the JI urged the election body for a timely conduct of polls.
A three-member tribunal of the ECP, headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja, reserved the verdict on the pleas on Friday. The decision was announced Monday afternoon.
“The application filed by the petition no-1 (MQM through its convener Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui) is rejected, and [the] application filed by petition no-3 (JI) is accepted,” the ECP ruled in its written order.
It directed the Sindh chief secretary, police chief and law enforcement agencies to assist election officials in conducting free and fair local government elections.
The Sindh government, JI and the PTI welcomed the decision.
“We respect the decision by the constitutional body,” Sindh Information Minister Sharjeel Memon told reporters at a press conference.
“The Sindh government is fully prepared to hold elections on time.”
The ECP noted that the MQM-P didn’t raise the issue of electoral rolls in hearings related to the conduct of polls, which are due for the last two years.
An MQM-P spokesperson said the election body was not only unable to fulfill its responsibility but it had also ignored legal obligations.
“One-fourth of the indigenous urban population will remain deprived of their representation due to fake delimitation and electoral rolls,” the spokesperson said in a statement.
Earlier in the day, the MQM-P moved the Sindh High Court to delay the polls, which the party alleged were being held on “fake delimitations and fake voting rolls.” Justice Iqbal Kalhoro rejected the MQM –P’s plea for forming a full bench and postponed the hearing till January 10.
