Both should not go out of bounds
The utility of an independent election commission cannot be over emphasised; merely overseeing the election process is an undertaking nothing short of a Herculean task. There are practically numerous little things that have to be carefully scrutinised, managed and executed, all in a manner that leave no doubt on the functioning of the election commission itself. However, as power comes intertwined with responsibility, there are a number of pitfalls one has to take care of. As the environment during elections is usually running on steroids, there are bound to be instances where even honest attempts at setting the records straight might be construed as a hit on one party or the other.
And as it happens this is exactly the case with the Election Commission of Pakistan and the parliamentarians. In a bid to bring more transparency, the ECP has sent notices to 249 parliamentarians to get their degrees verified. Politicians have, however, taken it as an exception and termed the ECP to be biased, busy in ‘politician-bashing’ and ‘witch hunt’. They claim that this equals to pre-poll politicians bashing. The government is also irked by ECP’s decision to stop development funds, grants and hiring before the elections which the EC thinks could give an undue advantage to the government to change voters’ sympathies. Furthermore, the decision by the commission to publicise financial details about the families of parliamentarians has also not quite made it any favourite of theirs.
Parliamentarians’ claim that the commission is not playing fair does not stand on its own though the commission might have done better by keeping the notices discreet and had kept in mind their privacy, and in certain cases security. The EC, being a non-elected body, lacks the trust the people depose in politicians when they vote them into power. Steps such as it has taken were sure to cause quite a bit of uproar. Accusations of indulging in ‘politician-bashing’ and ‘witch hunting’ were bound to ensue. Some would even say the language of the notice issued to the politicians and the mere fact that it was released to media smacks full of bias against politicians. The EC is treading troubled waters; it must not make it any more difficult for democracy to sustain and flourish by taking any unconstitutional step like delaying elections, neither should it opt for any arbitrary measure that could compromise the its integrity and impact the holding of elections.
The formation of a bipartisan committee by the House to plead for a more respectable treatment by the EC is a step in the right direction; however, politicians should not become a part of the problem and comply with the constitutional requirements. Same goes for the EC as well.