Interior minister writes letters to parliamentary leaders of all parties.
Though the government made an offer to the parliamentary leaders to hold a meeting over the issue with the view that magnetic ink was not used and verification of thumb impressions was not possible, it did not miss the opportunity to justify the removal of the Nadra chairman, saying “it is not one-man’s organisation”.
In response, Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) which had first made the demand for thumb impression verification of voters, said it had no objections to consultation with the government but added that it should not delay the ongoing process at election tribunals. “We don’t have objections to consultation with the government but that should not delay or undermine the legal process of electoral tribunals’ decisions to ask Nadra to verify thumb impressions,” PTI Secretary Information Shireen Mazari told The Express Tribune.
To a question, she referred to the policy statement of Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar over the issue on December 5 in the National Assembly that 60,000 to 70,000 votes would not be verifiable and said, “This means the government knows about mass rigging in all constituencies.”
“Someone must be held responsible,” she demanded. She also floated the idea of having electronic voting, saying that the system was being used in India, and generated immediate results.
The interior minister has sent letters to parliamentary leaders, in which he says, “I am taking this opportunity to ask you to give your considered opinion for the future course in this regard in a manner which is not prejudicial to the sanctity of the entire electoral process or the democratic institutions which appears to be the sole purpose behind this entire debate.”
“I am more than willing to organise a meeting of all the parliamentary leaders of political parties represented in the National Assembly, for reaching a consensus in this behalf.”
In his letter, the minister said the issue of verification of thumb impressions on ballot papers has been at the center of media scrutiny as well as public debates, judicial hearings and even parliament, with critics linking the removal of the Nadra chairman with the issue.
Nisar said it was perhaps not possible as “magnetic ink for thumb impressions was not used in the 2013 general elections.”
The minister justified the government’s decision of removing the Nadra chairman through six reasons cited in the letter, in which he raised questions about why magnetic ink was not used during the elections.
“In case the relevant authorities failed to procure the magnetic ink in time, what action was initiated by the previous government or the election commission which was overseeing the entire process?” the letter reads.
If verification is not possible, the minister writes, “who was responsible for the start of this public debate on the issue and what was the motive behind this act?”
The minister once again reiterated his government’s stance that it had no role in organising the general elections and added that the government was “not responsible for the procurement of magnetic ink, essential for thumb verification and validation, which was actually responsibility of the election commission or the caretaker government of Mir Hazar Khan Khoso.”
He also offered to hold thumb impression verification of voters in all 272 directly elected seats of the National Assembly, under the supervision of Justice (retd) Wajihuddin Ahmed of PTI.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 9th, 2013.
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