ECP fields RTS despite past failure

–CEC visits control room to review electoral process

–Overseas Pakistanis vote in by-elections for the first time

–NADRA reportedly thwarts attack on i-voting website

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has made Result Transmission System (RTS) and Result Management System (RMS) functional for prompt transmission of results from the polling stations to the district and central results system.

ECP, in collaboration with a National Database Regulatory Authority (NADRA) team, made the system functional. RTS had crashed in the July 25 general election, triggering serious questions about the transparency of the polls.

RTS, an android based application developed by NADRA for the transmission of results from the polling station to the central results system in real time.

The commission decided to use the system despite its collapse in the general polls.

Returning officers will compile and send results via RMS, whereas the presiding officer will use RTS for sending results to the central results system. A total 7, 185 polling stations have been connected to RTS.

The by-polls were conducted on 11 National and 24 Provincial Assembly seats, including 11 from Punjab Assembly, nine from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) and two each from Sindh and Balochistan.

CEC VISITS THE CONTROL ROOM IN ISLAMABAD:

Chief Election Commissioner Sardar Muhammad Raza Khan and Secretary Election Commission visited the control room established in the headquarters in Islamabad and reviewed the electoral process.

OVERSEAS PAKISTANIS VOTE IN BY-ELECTION:

Overseas Pakistanis cast their votes in the by-elections for the first time through i-voting.

ECP, in collaboration with NADRA, had developed software for online voting for overseas Pakistanis.

6,233 out of 7,463 registered overseas voters in 35 constituencies had cast their votes. These voters had been issued passwords and those without a password were not eligible to cast their votes.

CYBER-ATTACK ATTEMPTS AT I-VOTING WEBSITE THWARTED:

The website set up by ECP for i-voting by overseas Pakistanis reportedly sustained multiple cyber-attacks on Sunday.

Reportedly, i-voting website sustained 10,000 cyber-attacks simultaneously. NADRA authorities were, however, able to thwart the attack and the website from going down.

ECP’s IT Department Director General Muhammad Khizar Aziz said that the website had been loading slowly due to a lot of traffic and that was usual in the case. The ECP website is working properly, he added.