Pakistan Institute of Legislative Development and Transparency (PILDAT), an independent think tank, has commended the work done by the parliamentary committee on electoral reforms and termed it as a positive development for a better quality of elections in Pakistan. PILDAT also forwarded its proposed amendments in the Elections Bill 2017 to the parliamentary committee.
A key proposal is that all candidates for the membership of the senate and national and provincial assemblies should declare their permanent residential status in any foreign country in their nomination forms. “Since public office in Pakistan requires the physical presence and undivided attention of the elected legislators, it is very important for the electors to know the foreign residential status of the candidates, such as the US ‘Green Card’ or Saudi Iqama,” said the PILDAT statement.
The proposal also opposed exempting contributions of less than Rs. 100,000 from disclosing the name, address, and other particulars of the contributor. PILDAT said that all contributions, irrespective of the value, should be identified, recorded, and reported to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). In order to ensure transparency in political finance, it demanded that all financial statements submitted by the candidates, elected legislators and political parties should be uploaded onto the ECP website.
The proposals supported the granting of powers to the ECP to scrutinise the statements of assets and liabilities submitted by election candidates, elected legislators and political parties. It also demanded that election ads should not be allowed on television channels as these will make the election campaign very expensive. With regards to the provisions relating to political parties, PILDAT has recommended that it may be mandated by law that the central executive committee/central working committee of a party should be required to meet at least 4 times a year. In addition, political parties may be asked under law to maintain an updated roster of members, which the ECP may be allowed to inspect.
Political parties may also be required to make public, or place on their website, the updated list of all their office bearers. Similarly, powers and functions of the party head may also be clearly mentioned in the party’s constitution in order to avoid giving him/her blanket powers. PILDAT took strong exception to Section 239 of the proposed law, which states that the ECP would have the power to make rules “with the approval of the government”.
This severely diminishes the independence of the ECP and it should be allowed to make rules and procedures as it deems fit, without approval from the government. The proposals also stated that the proposed bill stipulates only 7 days for the review and scrutiny of nomination papers. This period is not enough and it is critical that the limit is increased to at least 28 days to facilitate the ECP’s cumbersome task of scrutiny.
PILDAT submitted the above proposals before the expiry of the deadline of January 19 and asked the committee to seriously consider and incorporate the proposed amendments before passing the bill.
