IHC rejects ECP's request to cancel LG polls in Islamabad

The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Monday rejected the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) request to suspend its single bench's decision regarding holding the local government (LG) polls in the federal capital and approved the hearing of intra-court appeals against the verdict on January 9,Aaj News reported.

On Friday, the IHC directed the ECP to hold local government elections in the capital the next day (December 31) and set aside the commission’s notification on the postponement of the polls. However, the elections were not held on Saturday, and instead, the federal government and the ECP lodged intra-court appeals against the IHC’s decision.

A two-member IHC bench headed by IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and comprising Justice Saman Rafat Imtiaz heard the intra-court appeals today.

Approving the appeals for hearing, the IHC issued notices to the respondents, including PTI leader Ali Nawaz Awan and Jamaat-i-Islami (JI) leader Mian Aslam, summoning them on Jan 9 — delaying the LG polls in the capital until then at least.

The court also dismissed the ECP’s plea to suspend the IHC single bench’s verdict.

During the course of the hearing today, the ECP's lawyer argued that the single bench had not taken the high court's previous decision into consideration upon which the court inquired what had happened when the matter was sent to the electoral watchdog.

The lawyer informed the court that the ECP had postponed local body elections on December 27 and that the verdict issued by the election regulatory body on December 28 was not challenged adding that "the verdict was final".

The ECP's director general of law also informed the court that on December 28 the election regulatory body had decided to delay the polls and its order had been based on IHC’s December 27 ruling.

"The reasons cited by the ECP were not even considered by the single bench," the lawyer argued.

The court inquired if the ECP could be "ordered" and "what would have happened if the court had simply declared the ECP's decision illegal".

"The ECP is free to take decisions independently," the DG Law stated.

Upon the CJ's questioning, the DG Law also informed the court that if elections are delayed for any reason, a new date needs to be announced by the ECP and that fresh elections can be called within 120 days if the number of union councils is increased.

Later, the IHC reserved its decision on the ECP and the federal government's appeals against the order to hold local elections in the federal capital and issued notices to parties on appeals related to Islamabad local government elections.