Rigging in PP-107: Election ‘does not reflect true will of people’

Tribunal report finds ‘extensive corrupt and illegal practices’

LAHORE:

Massive rigging was carried out in the 2013 general elections, with assistance at individual and party levels as well as by politicians, the election tribunal’s report has revealed.

On the basis of the election record, the 30-page report states that extensive corrupt and illegal practices were carried out during the election process.

The extracts of the report, focusing on PP-107, Hafizabad-III, stated that “the result of the election favourable to the returned candidate is not the will of the electors of the constituency in the true sense at all”. Tribunal judge Kazim Ali Malik states, “The election does not reflect the true will of the people.”

“I am fully justified on the basis of documentary evidence to set aside the election of the returned candidate, which does not reflect the true will of the people,” Malik states in the report. “I therefore discard the available record as well as the election record, which has been misappropriated or stolen. I declare the election of the returned candidates from PP-107, Hafizabad-III as a whole to be void.”

In PP-107, Hafizabad-III, 21,298 fake and bogus votes were counted as valid votes towards the vote account of the candidates. The number of used counterfoils found in election bags by the commission was 54,242, while the total number of polled votes in a statement by the Returning Officer (RO) was recorded as 72,895.

The report states that 6,492 ballot papers shown by the RO as validly polled votes are not available in the election bags. Therefore, 6,492 votes were counted towards the vote account of the candidates without any basis. “It is evident from the tabulated statement based on the record that 2,284 valid votes had not been counted towards the vote account of the contesting candidates,” the report states. “Hence, it can be said that either the officers assigned the task of preparing and consolidating the results of the count did not attach required importance to the job or they excluded 2,284 votes from the count for some extraneous consideration.”

Additionally, the tribunal states that 554 votes excluded from the count by the RO in terms of section 39 (3) of the Act, 1976 do not exist. The RO, who re-sealed the election bags after examination of the rejected votes as under Section 39 (3) deposited the bags with the District Treasury. The report concludes that the “RO completely and miserably failed to discharge the obligation cast on him.”

“The election process was concluded in a slipshod manner by the presiding officers without any objection from the RO who was supposed to keep them under constant watch to ensure transparency and credibility,” the report states.

Meanwhile at 65 polling stations, the consolidated statement of the count by the RO does not match statements of the figures in the Account Form XIV. In various polling stations, the forms are not available even as the RO claimed to have prepared consolidated statements on the basis of the forms.

The report observes: “Extensive corrupt and illegal practices were committed in the election process. This is a textbook example of a novel election, which had been destroyed at each and every stage.”





























































Published in The Express Tribune, September 24^th, 2014.