ECP data shows dismal ratio of women voters

There is a huge disparity in the voter list

ISLAMABAD: The ratio of women voters was found to be dismally low in certain parts of the country, even in some urban centres, recently-updated electoral lists on the Election Commission of Pakistan’s website showed.

According to the lists, revised on March 17 this year, there were 90 tehsils across the country, where the ratio of registered women voters was less than 30 per cent of the total voters.



In North Waziristan, the ratio of women voters against men amounted to just 2.89 per cent.

The ECP data showed that the ominous trend was not just confined to remote, militancy-hit areas. Statistics from urban centers such as Karachi were just as depressing.

In Karachi’s Orangi Town neighbourhood, the ratio of registered women voters amounts to 39.89 per cent, in Gaddap Town (District East), it is 31.66 per cent and Gaddap Town (West), it is just 38.66 per cent.

Not only is there an overall gender-wise discrepancy in the country’s voters list, in certain areas, this disparity is even more glaring.



According to the ECP lists, among the country’s 93 million registered voters, 56.26 per cent are males and 43.74 are females.

In its first meeting of the newly-setup Gender and Disability Electoral Working Group at the ECP Secretariat, its officials made some startling revelations and emphasized upon the need for improving the percentage of women in voters’ list.

According to Sher Afghan, an additional secretary in ECP, an estimated 10.1 million women, above the age of 18 years and eligible to get registered as voters, did not have Computerised National Identity Cards (CNICs), a prerequisite to be enlisted in the electoral list.

Among other reasons, most women do not want to apply for CNICs because they wanted to avoid being photographed, a compulsory NADRA requirement.

ECP officials said they would suggest NADRA to allow such women to get their CNICs without a picture and use their thumb impressions for verifying their record.



ECP statistics showed that in Rajanpur district of southern Punjab, the ratio of women in electoral lists was just 24.1 per cent while in Bannu district of K-P, it was only 20 per cent.



Published in The Express Tribune, May 7^th, 2016.