Summary Although commission declared the elections free, fair, it also pointed out the ECP’s weaknesses
ISLAMABAD: (Dunya News) – Although Judicial Commission (JC) has on Thursday declared the General Elections 2013 free and fair in its report, it has also pointed out some of the weaknesses and mistakes of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and other institutions in the same report. For example, the report says that the National Database Registration Authority (NADRA) failed to verify the thumb-impressions, reported Dunya News.
Election Commission has also recommended to hold the elections in Karachi under army’s supervision till the time the law and order situation in the city improves. Report accepted that there were several issues with the ECP. It says that there was lack of communication between the ECP and the polling staff. It also said that it was interesting to note that the ECP had no monitoring system during the elections.
The commission said that extra ballot papers were printed in many of the Punjab constituencies and it is also correct that the Form-15, which keeps record of the ballot papers, were also missing. It said that the electoral staff was also not trained and incidents of late arrival of the polling staff at various polling stations were also recorded. Report said that all this happened due to ECP’s incompetence.
JC also mentioned the NADRA reports regarding verification of the thumb-impressions. It said that a large number of votes could not be verified.
Responding to the allegation that the bureaucracy used to report to Raiwind instead of the caretaker Chief Minister of Punjab Najam Sethi, the commission said that it is a part of Pakistan’s political culture.
