Rulers broke the rigging record of 1977 general elections during the local bodies elections and all out efforts were made to get its candidates elected, hence the Supreme Court should take a suo motu notice on the issue.
Moreover, the opposition political parties might demand holding of future general elections under the UN supervision, as under the rule of General Pervez Musharraf, holding of fair and transparent elections was not possible.
PML-N Central Information Secretary Muhammad Siddiqul Farooq made these demands while addressing a press conference here on Saturday. He also presented the copies of PML-N's White Paper on the local bodies elections to media men on this occasion.
Siddiqul Farooq maintained that even the members of the government admitted that the rigging did take place, while the government was using its powers to prevent the discussion on local bodies' elections in the National Assembly. He said that the government openly rigged the LB elections, which proves the fact that genuine political parties' vote bank was still intact, and had the elections been held in a fair and transparent the rulers would not even able to secure more than five-percent of the LB seats.
He claimed that people of Pakistan were fed up with the government on its failure to control price hike, unemployment and law and order situation, while they rejected the government for making compromises on the Kashmir issue and Islam. "International agencies have declared the LB polls farce and rigged", he added.
He claimed that the government put pressure on the acting chief election commissioner to use 2001 voters list, although computerised voters list of 2004, which includes new voters, was finalised, thus 4 million voters were denied of their right to vote. He pointed out that despite ban on transfers and postings of government servants and allocation of development funds to district government, the rulers grossly violated it to give an edge to their backed candidates.
He further said that the CMs personally carried out election campaigns of their candidates. He alleged that the rulers provided their candidates with ballot boxes and machines for issuing fake identity cards before the elections. "Thousands of fake identity cards were issues and many voters found that their votes had already been cast," he added.
While dismissing the rulers' claim that the local bodies' elections were held peacefully, he said that many people were killed and injured, while the election commission received 6,779 complaints of gross violations. "All these happened in the presence of the army, rangers and the police. In fact, these institutions ensured rigging during the elections," he added.
According to him, the government was doing nothing but following the dictates of US President Bush, Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, while in the guise of enlightenment and modernisation, it was promoting vulgarity. Moreover, people were not getting justice and the recent case of Sonia Naz was a prime example of that in, which a relative of Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi was also involved.
He observed that all the military rulers staged election dramas and in the process deprived the people of Pakistan of their right to true democracy. He blasted that like the past the military regime and the 'stooge politicians have denied the people of their democratic rights during the recent elections'.
"The so-called elected parliamentarians from the ruling party have sided with the military regime to temper with the constitution for personal gains, which tantamount to abrogation of the constitution. Hence, it was imperative to try these people under Article 6 of the constitution, otherwise the integrity of the country was at stake," he added.
On the issue of starting movement against the rulers, he said that they had raised the issue in the ARD meeting of August 29 and they would do so again in the meeting of September 3, as they were committed to start the movement. "However, if the grand alliance refuse to join in the anti-government movement, the PML-N would alone kick off a countrywide protest very soon," he added
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