HEC challenges ECP on fake degree-holders

The Higher Education Commission (HEC) challenged the recent move of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to make way for fake degree holders to contest in the upcoming elections.
According to a report from the HEC, the commission has reservations over an ECP decision to provide clearance to 27 fake degree holders. In a letter to the ECP, the HEC categorically said there were “discrepancies” in the ECP press release in which it admitted it had cleared cases of 27 fake degree-holding parliamentarians.
Four of these 27 were not present in the HEC’s list of fake degree-holders whereas according to this letter, concerned universities of only three out of the remaining 23 members confirmed to the HEC that their degrees were genuine.
So 20 out of 23 MPs cleared by the ECP were given a clean chit wrongly, despite the fact that their degrees were found fake and bogus by the HEC as well as the concerned universities. Though the ECP has cleared degrees in some cases but in many cases the ECP did not proceed against fake-degree holders on grounds such as the MP was re-elected, had resigned, or brought witnesses from universities to prove his/her degree as genuine. The press release from HEC also said the ECP decision in 90 percent of cases was “incorrect” and acknowledged that out of an HEC list of 56 fake degree-holders, only in three cases was the decision reversed.