EDITORIAL: The state of uncertainly about general elections is finally over with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) ‘agreeing’ to do its duty come February 8.
Considering that the electoral body has been refusing to give a precise date on one pretext or another, it might have kept dithering but for the Supreme Court bringing it around to settle the issue.
Interestingly, during the case hearing on Thursday, relying on a law passed by the outgoing parliament the ECP on its own proposed February 11 as the polling day, only to face rejection.
A three-member bench headed by the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa ensured that the constitutional provision that authorised the President under Article 48(4) to appoint the election date was followed, ordering the ECP to consult with the President.
Once the “date comes it must be considered as if carved in stone”, observed the CJP. In pursuance of court order Chief Election Commissioner Sultan Raja along with four ECP members and Attorney General for Pakistan met with President Arif Alvi, where it was unanimously decided to hold elections on February 8 — over three months past the constitutionally mandated timeframe.
Earlier, when informed by a counsel about the ECP’s arbitrary decision to hold the polls on February 11 Justice Isa, a stickler for constitutional rules, ordered that if the President was not on board, he should be consulted “right now”, and took a break to provide the ECP the opportunity to do that.
As he aptly observed that “institutions do not develop if they do not do their assigned jobs.” He also warned that any deviation from the final date would “entail consequences”, adding that the court will not entertain any extension application. All three honourable members of the bench dictated the order, and underscoring the matter’s urgency got their two-page order promptly printed inside the courtroom, errors corrected, and signed it to be delivered right away to the Attorney General for Pakistan.
After the date was duly settled, for their part counsels for the two petitioners, the PPP and the PTI, said they had no objection to the holding of general elections on February 8, since what the political parties wanted was a polling date.
Now that there is no dubiety about if or when the elections are to be held, all political parties have ample time to prepare for the electoral contest. In fact, a noticeable sharp political divide makes electoral campaigns a mere formality; the people seem to have already made up their minds who to vote for.
Two concerns, however, demand satisfactory answers. One is that despite political parties repeatedly calling for a level playing field there is no sign of that happening. The electoral exercise will have little credibility if workers and leaders of a major political party, the PTI, continue to be entangled in legal cases generally deemed to be unfair, and kept behind bars.
Second is that whether those who delayed elections in blatant violation of the Constitution will manage to go scot-free, encouraging others in future to follow suit, or are to get their due. They should be held to account for the good of this ever-struggling democracy, and good of the long-term socio-economic progress of the country.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023