PESHAWAR: The whole country was delighted when Justice (retd) Fakhruddin G Ebrahim was made the chief election commissioner (CEC) and stated that the full details of every contestant would be made available on the website of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP). This was the primary promise he made to the people of Pakistan. ECP officials appeared on television and further confirmed this resolve. The Supreme Court, on at least two occasions, also asked the ECP to make this information accessible to people on its website. The ECP secretary made a statement to the Supreme Court that this will be done.
The fact of the matter is that as of today, not only has the ECP failed to place the details of nomination forms submitted by the contestants online, there also does not seem to be any movement towards accomplishing this task. Despite the repeated statements from the Supreme Court asking that action against fake degree holders and dual nationals be taken, the ECP could not disqualify even a single candidate on its own. The ECP seems to have little idea of the self-executing clauses of the law that allow it to take disqualification actions on its own and send the cases to other trial courts for punishment purposes only. The ECP has thus violated its own charter, as well as the Supreme Court’s decisions.
The ECP, as an institution, has totally failed to meet the expectations of the people and its actions have ended up protecting corrupt politicians, thus ensuring another flawed election and more misery for the people of Pakistan.
These actions have also cast an uncalled for shadow over the good name of Justice (retd) Ebrahim. Clearly, the bureaucrats of the ECP have managed to dodge the CEC and have not implemented his orders.
I request the CEC to please order the ECP secretary to undertake all these actions immediately. In case, he finds that the bureaucrats are not responding to his orders, he must take action against them and replace them with those who are competent and courageous to take these much-needed actions.
Professor Jaunaid R Qureshi
Published in The Express Tribune, March 30th, 2013.
