Though, the Election Commission has started voters verification process in the metropolis under the orders of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, the major politico-religious parties have expressed their reservations on the whole process and demanded that Pakistan Army (PA) should carry out the verification process instead of only providing security to the staff.
These political parties alleged that the Sindh Election Commissioner Mehboob Anwar was taking instructions from the Sindh Governor Dr Ishratul Ibad Khan regarding the verification process, which had been a cause of concern for the political and religious parties. The demand came up in a meeting of the representatives of at least ten political and religious parties who called on the election commissioner at his office on Wednesday. These parties included Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Jamat-e-Islami (JI), Sunni Tehreek (ST), Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Jamiat-e-Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-F), Awami National Party (ANP), Jamaat-e-Ulema-e-Pakistan (JUI-Noorani), National Peoples Party (NPP) and others.
While talking to the Sindh election commissioner, the leaders including JI’s Muhammad Hussain Mehnati, PML-N’s Irfanullah Marwat, JUI_F’s Qari Usman, ST’s Matloob Awan, PTI’s Hafeezuddin Advocate, and others expressed their serious reservation on the voters verification process in the city and expressed complete dissatisfaction. Alleging that the election commissioner was working on the instructions of Sindh governor, the leaders demanded that the verification of voters lists should be conducted directly by the PA and the Frontier Core (FC).
“If, the verification process is not stopped immediately, the episode of protest demos and sit-ins would be launched against the election commission,” they warned.
The leaders alleged that the voter names were being marked with pencils instead of ball points in the offices of a particular political party that had in-turn made the whole verification process murky and controversial. Per law, the Sindh election commissioner was an independent official, but in this particular case, he was obeying the orders of Sindh governor, they alleged, adding that they had completely rejected the present voters’ verification process. The Sindh election commission had not been implemented in letter and spirit according to the SCP order, they said. They further announced that they would approach the SCP with a plea that the verification process should be conducted by the PA. Later, the Sindh election commissioner assured the leaders of the political and religious parties that he would take up this matter with the chief election commissioner of Pakistan shortly.
