Delayed verification: With 72 hours left, scrutiny drags on

Returning officers are still in the process of forwarding summary sheets to the ECP headquarters.

ISLAMABAD:

With only 72 hours left to complete the scrutiny of nomination papers, election authorities were still receiving the ‘summary sheets’ of candidates from returning officers (ROs), casting doubts over the efficiency of the whole exercise.

By Thursday evening, a total 21,907 summary sheets were received by the Election Commission headquarters, which forwards the same to the National Database and Registration Authority (NADRA), Federal Board of Revenue, State Bank of Pakistan and National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to verify the information provided by the candidates and to check their financial and criminal history.

The institutions send their feedback to the ROs – mostly district and session judges – who are tasked with the formal scrutiny of the nomination forms.

The last date for filing the forms expired on Sunday midnight and scrutiny was formally kicked off on Monday. Despite this, the election authorities have so far released no clear figure on the total number of forms submitted. According to the election schedule, scrutiny has to be completed by April 7. The ROs are required to send a summary sheet, which contains the applicant’s name, computerised national identity card number and national tax number, to the ECP for feedback from NAB, FBR and SBP.

According to ECP data, so far a total of 19,415 summary sheets have been processed by the three institutions and feedback on the respective candidates has been forwarded to ROs, who will take the final decision on the eligibility of the candidates.

The delay in forwarding summary sheets to the ECP HQ has left NAB, FBR and SBP with little time to pore over contestants’ credentials and ROs with even lesser time for final scrutiny. ECP officials have blamed the ROs for the delay.

ECP to scrutinise candidates for minority seats today

The RO at the ECP HQ will scrutinise the nominations filed for the National Assembly seats reserved for minorities today (Friday).

Over 180 candidates have filed their nomination papers for 10 minority seats in the lower house. The non-Muslim reserved seats are allocated to the candidates of political parties in proportion to the number of directly elected seats that a party wins.

ECP to hear the cases fake degree holders today

The ECP will be hearing the cases of 24 former lawmakers accused of either falsifying their academic records or submitting a dubious degree for the 2008 elections today (Friday). These members were among over 60 former lawmakers whose educational certificates were declared bogus by the Higher Education Commission.

However, cases against 27 of them were dropped by the ECP claiming various reasons. The Supreme Court in a recent judgment asked the ECP to re-open the closed cases.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 5^th, 2013.