Apex court permits ECP to issue new LG poll schedule for Sindh, Punjab

SC states new schedule should be announced after all necessary preparations for the elections are completed.

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Monday gave the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) permission to issue a new schedule for the Local Government (LG) elections in Sindh and Punjab, Express News reported.

The court said that the new schedule should be announced after all necessary preparations for the elections including delimitation are completed.

Secretary ECP Ishtiaq Ahmed Khan stated that the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, Cantonment Board and Islamabad elections will be held on February 28.

The hearing was adjourned and will resume in the first week of February.

The ECP had filed an application before the Supreme Court on January 6 after decisions of the provinces’ respective high courts had deemed that delimitation in Punjab and Sindh was illegal.

In view of both high court judgements, ECP’s application had said that the Punjab Local Government Act, 2013 and Sindh Government Act, 2013 have to be amended by the respective provinces and fresh delimitation has to be carried out in light of the courts’ rulings and the current schedule did not allow sufficient time to make the necessary preparations.

According to the current schedule, polling in Sindh  should take place on January 18 and in Punjab on January 30.