Fair elections: ‘Only judges should be district returning officers’

Opposition to resist two amendments to Local Government Act.

LAHORE:

The opposition will strongly resist the government’s plan to amend the Punjab Local Government Act of 2013 to change how members are indirectly elected to reserved seats and to allow non-judicial officers to act as district returning officers, said Opposition Leader Mian Mehmoodur Rasheed.

The governor introduced four ordinances to amend the Act and these are to be presented in the Punjab Assembly for approval during its ongoing session. Rasheed told The Express Tribune that two of the amendments would allow the government undue influence in election matters and should the opposition fail to defeat the amendments in the house, it would move the courts against them.



According to Section 15(1) of the Act, the Metropolitan Corporation (the local government for Lahore), will include reserved seats for 25 women members, five worker members, three technocrat members, two youth members and 10 non-Muslim members, to be elected indirectly by the chairmen, vice chairmen and members of union councils.

According to Section 15(2), a municipal corporation will include reserved seats for women members (up to 15, depending on the number of UCs in the corporation), two worker members, two technocrats, one youth members, and non-Muslim members (up to five, depending on the number of non-Muslim voters in the corporation), again, to be elected indirectly by the chairmen, vice chairmen and members of union councils.

But the ordinance removed the words “vice chairmen” and “members” from the section, leaving the indirect election to just the union council chairmen. Rasheed said that tok away the rights of vice chairmen and members. The vice chairmen and UC members will still be able to vote for mayors and deputy mayors of metropolitan and municipal corporations, but not members on reserved seats.

Section 22 of the Punjab Local Government Act states, “The Election Commission of Pakistan shall appoint from amongst the officers of the Election Commission, the Government, [or] a body or entity controlled by the Government, a Returning Officer and an Assistant Returning Officer for each constituency for the purposes of direct election under this Act.” An amendment would include district returning officers to this section. Rasheed said that at the time the law was passed, there was an understanding that the district returning officer would be the district and sessions judge, as in the general elections. The amendment would mean that a government officer could be appointed as the district returning officer.

“If the DRO is from the executive, how can he be expected to remain neutral?” he said, adding that the opposition would propose a new amendment, stating that the district returning officer must be from the judiciary.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 9^th, 2013.