Time for it to act is NOW
The just released NADRA report opens a veritable can of worms. On a petition by the losing PTI candidate in NA-256 Karachi, alleging massive rigging during the May 2013 elections, the Election Tribunal ordered NADRA to verify voters’ thumb impressions on the ballots. The revelations of large scale fraud committed despite all the safeguards and precautions put in place by the ECP are nothing short of shocking and may even tend to cast a shadow over the authenticity of the entire elections. It is true that Karachi, along with Hyderabad, represent unique electoral locations due to the almost monopolistic hold, spread over long years, of the MQM – which is loath to accept any ‘intruders’ in its ‘territory’. The winner in the challenged constituency also belonged to it.
The NADRA report statistics verge on the fantastic: 11343 ballot papers with fake NIC numbers, instances of bogus voting in at least three polling stations with 791 votes cast that were not registered, cases of multiple voting with 5839 duplicate votes cast by 2812 ‘enterprising’ voters and in one anarchic example, seven votes cast or rather ‘overcast’ against one identity card alone. It is quite unbelievable: out of 84748 ballots paper from certain disputed polling stations, only 6815 matched the fingerprint record, while the thumb impressions of 57642 votes were so faint that they could not be compared at all. Thankfully, the ECP has now asked the Election Tribunal to dispose of the PTI contestant’s petition by Oct 25, deciding whether the situation warrants a re-election – a welcome development.
But the sorry state of affairs exposed by NADRA in the case of NA-256 (and NA-258 Karachi) raises many questions. First, it reinforces the charges of nationwide rigging leveled by almost all parties after elections, the PML-N being an exception. Second, was the ECP mechanism with its assortment of returning officers and polling staff not up to the task when it came to prevention of open rigging? Was it complicit in the cheating or was it subjected to impossible-to-resist pressure and threats? At the least a few of the staff could have reported the matter, as in the blatant case of NA- 256. It all boils down to the familiar ifs and buts argument after the event: if only the army personnel were deputed inside the polling stations instead of providing sentry duty. But the ECP’s deficiencies stand fully exposed. The time to get its act together is NOW.
