KARACHI: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Wednesday inquired about the delay in poll results and asked the provincial election commissioners and district returning officers to submit an explanation of the same.
In a written order, the electoral body asked the relevant officers to submit an explanation about the delay in poll results beyond 2am.
It was reported that a day after the countrywide polls, on July 26, ECP Secretary Babar Yaqoob had said the General Election 2018 results were delayed due to a “technical glitch” in the result transmission system while data was entered into it.
He further added that the delay was not caused by any “conspiracy”, adding, that “the RTS system had not been tested in Pakistan.”
Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari was also among those who raised the issue of the delayed results.
He said, “The party’s candidates had complained that their polling agents had been thrown out of polling stations across the country.”
On July 25, Pakistan voted for the country’s second consecutive democratic transfer of power.
Polling began at 8:00 am across the country’s 85,307 polling stations and continued until 6:00 pm, despite calls by several major parties, including Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and PPP, to extend the polling time by an hour.
The parties sought more time as there were complains of “a slow voting process”. Following this, the ECP held an urgent meeting and dismissed the request for an extension.
The election campaign was marred by violence with three candidates killed in targetted attacks and culminated with a suicide blast outside a polling station in Quetta which claimed at least 30 lives.
