Troops to man every polling station in Karachi

Accepting opposition parties’ requests, the Election Commission on Thursday decided to deploy army personnel at every polling station in Karachi in the upcoming general election, as it agreed in principle to not shift settler peoples’ votes to the addresses of their home towns.
The opposition parties have been alleging that during the voters lists’ verification process, votes of their supporters had been shifted to other parts of the country to their permanent addresses, and in their place, name of unverified voters had been inserted.
The Election Commission agreed in principle that during the verification process, no vote would be shifted to permanent addresses.
“Karachi has become a problem city, so we have decided to deploy army personnel at every polling station in the coming election. One soldier will be present at each polling station until the final results are not announced. Our future depends on free and fair elections. So let me assure you that every act will be done to conduct free, fair and transparent election,” Chief Commissioner Fakhruddin G Ebrahim said in a press briefing on Thursday. Earlier, the commission held a detailed meeting with opposition parties wherein the representatives told the commission that without deployment of army personnel in Karachi, free and fair elections could not be held. The political parties were of the view that some elements used to force people at gun point to cast vote for their party.
During the meeting, JI leader Liaqat Baloch and representatives of Sunni Tehreek expressed serious concern over the ongoing verification process in Karachi. The opposition parties urged the ECP to implement Supreme Court order about the delimitation and voter verification process in Karachi in letter and spirit. “During the tenure of Pervez Musharraf, the process of delimitation of Karachi’s constituencies was conducted at gun point, which now needs to be rectified,” Baloch said.
To this, ECP Secretary Ishtiak Ahmed said the subject of delimitation of constituencies of Karachi was sub judice. “Once the court rules over the issue we will follow the orders,” he said. To a query, the secretary said opposition parties should approach the SC to get order for not shifting the voters whose votes were not being verified to their home towns. “When opposition parties take up this issue in SC, we will support their demand,” the secretary said.