ISLAMABAD:
The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Tuesday again warned the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government and federal authorities against any delay in local government (LG) elections, directing them to submit all pending delimitation notifications by July 28.
The term of the LGs in the KP ended on March 15 this year. Under the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Local Government Act, 2013, local representatives are elected for a four-year term.
The term of Islamabad’s last local government expired in February 2021 and elections have since been delayed under various pretexts, leaving around 2.5 million residents without elected local representatives. The ECP heard separate cases relating to LG elections in KP and Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).
In the KP case, chief secretary Shehab Ali Shah, provincial LG secretary and Pakistan Bureau of Statistics (PBS) officials appeared before a four-member bench headed by Sindh ECP member Nisar Ahmed Durrani.
The chief commissioner and deputy commissioner of Islamabad also appeared in the ICT case.
The commission recalled that on July 1, it blamed the two governments for “unnecessarily delaying” the elections, warning that creating obstacles in the conduct of LG elections could lead to serious consequences.
In its previous five-page order, the ECP observed that the KP government was not providing “meaningful assistance” to the commission as required under Article 220 of the Constitution.
Citing the Supreme Court judgments reported as 2014 SCMR 1 and 2021 SCMR 714, he held that failure to assist the commission amounted to violation of the Constitution.
The ECP noted that on April 22, it had asked for three documents required for delimitation in 15 districts: tehsil notifications of ward councils (NCs) and village councils (VCs), category-wise reserved seats and authenticated maps.
A recall issued on May 15 received a response that the commission described as unsatisfactory.
