ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has summoned the Sindh government officials on the coming Monday in a bid to resolve its row with the provincial government over the issue of delimitation of constituencies for local government (LG) elections in Sindh after Pakistan People's Party (PPP) - the ruling party in the province - has categorically rejected the electoral body's delimitation plan.
In a top-level meeting on Thursday presided over by the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sikandar Sultan Raja and attended by the provincial election commissioners and other senior officers, the ECP decided to summon the Sindh government officials at 11 am on Sep 7 (Monday) in connection with delimitation exercise row, Business Recorder has learnt.
On Aug 31, the Sindh government formally issued a notification announcing the dissolution of all the elected LG offices in the province on the completion of their four-year term a day earlier. Following this development, the ECP, on the same date, issued the schedule for the delimitation of constituencies ahead of LG elections.
According to the schedule, the publication of the preliminary list of constituencies for inviting representations and objections would be on September 23; whereas, the filing of representations and objections before the delimitation authorities by the voters concerned would take place between September 23 and October 7.
The disposal of representations and objections by the delimitation authorities would happen in the next 15 days until Oct 22.
The last date for the communication of decisions of the delimitation authorities to the delimitation committees would be October 29, while the final publication of the list of constituencies by the delimitation committees would take place on Oct 30.
However, the PPP has rejected the delimitation plan with party leaders including Nisar Khuhro and Taj Haider having written letters to the electoral body in which they have said that the ECP would commit an unconstitutional step if it goes ahead with its plan to do fresh delimitation and conduct new LG elections in Sindh on the basis of the provisional results of 2017 census, saying that the population of Sindh had been counted less than the actual count in the last population census drive in the country in 2017 and the province did have objections in this regard.
Constitutionally, the ECP is bound to hold delimitation of constituencies on the basis of population as per last population census. Article 51 (5) reads, "The seats in the National Assembly shall be allocated to each province and the Federal Capital on the basis of population in accordance with the last preceding census officially published:
Provided that for purposes of the next general elections to be held in 2018 and bye-elections related thereto, the allocation shall be made on the basis of provisional results of the 2017 census which shall be published by the Federal Government."
The PPP leaders are of the view that political parties had shown consent only to the conduct of the last general elections in the country in 2018 on the basis of the 2017 census drive and that the conduct of new LG elections and fresh delimitation exercise without finalizing the results of the population census would be an unconstitutional act.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2020
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