Local bodies elections in as many as 42 Cantonment Boards in the country will take place today (Saturday) after 17 years.
According to Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), 12,400 troops of Pakistan Army and Rangers will be deployed on security duty for the elections across the country.
Troops have been requisitioned by Election Commission of Pakistan to ensure security and to assist the election watchdog in smooth conduct of polling.
According to details, the boards have been divided into 199 wards and as many as 1,191 candidates are contesting the elections. As many as 1.9 million voters will elect their representatives in the landmark elections.
Karachi’s Cantonment Board has the most wards – 32, whereas Lahore Cantt has 20. Rawalpindi, Chaklala, Wah Cantt, Sargodha and Hyderabad have 10 wards each while Sialkot, Peshawar, Okara, Quetta and Abbottabad Cantts have five wards each.
The cantonments in Nowshera have four wards, Kohat, Risalpur and Bahawalpur have three wards each while the remaining two cantonments have two wards each.
At least 14 candidates have been elected unopposed thus far out of which two each belong to the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), one to Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz while nine are independent candidates.
At least 541 candidates belonging to as many as 18 parties will contest the elections. PTI has the most candidates i.e. 135, PML-N has 128 while PPP has 89 candidates. MQM and PAT have 27 candidates each. The remaining 610 candidates are independent.
