Internally-displaced persons: Court moved against ECP for insufficient polling stations

Criticised for not facilitating uprooted families from Orakzai.

HANGU:

Former federal minister and a candidate for NA-39, Dr Ghazi Gulab Jamal, has filed a writ petition in the Peshawar High Court against the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for failing to establish more than one polling station for internally-displaced persons (IDPs) of Orakzai Agency.

Talking to The Express Tribune on Thursday, Jamal said 70 per cent of upper and central Orakzai’s population has been living in different parts of the country for the past four years. He said the only polling station for these persons was in Serai Muhammad Khwaja, Hangu, adding the station could not accommodate more than 9,000 voters.

He criticised the ECP for depriving a large number of tribesmen from their right to vote. He added suffrage should be extended to these displaced families the same way it is given to Kahmiris, who can cast their votes in any part of the country. “If this is not possible, the ECP needs to set up polling stations in Kohat, Peshawar and Hangu,” he suggested.

Jamal went on to say the IDPs had rights equal to those of any other Pakistani. He claimed 30 per cent of voters from the agency would boycott elections if proper measures were not taken to include the IDPs.

Meanwhile, 15 displaced tribes from the agency announced their decision to boycott elections. Addressing a news conference, Malik Sapeen Gul, a candidate for NA-39, along with a large number of elders said a single polling station in Hangu for scores of uprooted families was unjustified.

He claimed only one station was meant to serve displaced people living in Kohat, Rawalpindi, Peshawar, Hangu and other parts of the country. Gul alleged applications had been filed in the ECP along with relevant data in regard to this issue, but were ignored by the commission.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th, 2013.