ISLAMABAD: The Ministry of Defense, which is responsible for allocating security for election duty, on Tuesday moved the Supreme Court seeking that polls be held across Pakistan on the same date, deepening discord between the judiciary and government amid months of political and economic turmoil.
The top judiciary and the opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party of former Prime Minister Imran Khan have been locked in a standoff with the coalition government at the center over provincial snap polls. The political turmoil is happening amid soaring inflation and an acute balance of payments crisis as talks with the IMF to secure $1.1 billion in funding, part of a $6.5 billion bailout package agreed to in 2019, have so far yielded no results.
Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government says it is not economically viable to hold snap elections in two provinces, Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where Khan had dissolved the governments in January this year, ahead of a general election due in October.
Voting is constitutionally mandated within 90 days of the dissolution of a legislative assembly.
The Supreme Court on April 4 ordered snap polls in the most populated Punjab province to be held on May 14, and said a date could be agreed later for the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, pending some technical issues. The court also ruled that the Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) decision to postpone polls to the Punjab assembly till October 8 was “unconstitutional.”
“The instant application may be granted, the order dated 04-04-2023 passed in C.P. No. 5/2023 may kindly be recalled with the directions that the general elections to the National and all Provincial Assemblies be held together, upon completion of the term of the National and the other two Provincial Assemblies i.e. of Sindh and Balochistan,” the defense ministry said in a plea filed with the top court on Tuesday, referring to the two other major provinces of Pakistan.
Khan had ordered the dissolution of legislative assemblies run by his party in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab to try to force the government to hold early national elections. He has been campaigning for snap polls since he was ousted in a parliamentary no confidence vote in April last year.
In response to the Supreme Court regarding elections in Punjab, the ECP also said on Tuesday that holding polls on May 14 was becoming “impossible” as both funds and security arrangements were not in place.
“At least 466,000 personnel are required for security in Punjab,” the ECP said in its reply. “In view of ground facts, October 8 is the appropriate date to conduct elections.”
