Meeting today: Fresh bid to break logjam over Balochistan LB polls

Next stage stalled as BEC demands new legislation, which govt deems unnecessary.

ISLAMABAD:

Despite the impasse between the Balochistan Election Commission (BEC) and the provincial government over the next leg of the local bodies’ elections, the two sides will meet in Quetta today (Thursday) to end the weeks-long standoff.

“We will meet [today] to resolve the outstanding issue,” Kazim Niaz, the provincial administrative secretary for local government, confirmed to The Express Tribune.

The BEC has been insisting for new legislation by the provincial assembly to conduct elections for reserved seats – that marks the third and second-last phase of the polls. However, the government considers the demand unnecessary.

In this phase, candidates had to be elected for the 33% of seats allotted to women and the 15% to various interest groups, including technocrats, professionals, social workers, labourers, youth representatives, minorities and peasants.

Even though Niaz accused the BEC for the constant delay in fulfilling its constitutional obligations, he said both sides would discuss the matter at their meeting to resolve the issue.

The provincial government has been censured by political rivals over its failure to complete the local bodies’ election process in the province that was initiated with the balloting for 7,000 seats on December 7.

The first phase of the local bodies’ polls for over 7,000 seats was completed on December 7 last year, which elected over 6,500 councillors from the province. By-elections were held during the second phase on January 19.

Moreover, the two-month long hold-up has irked the 6,500 councillors-elect as they are being denied their legal and democratic right to choose mayors and chairpersons of municipal corporations, district councils and union councils.

Meanwhile, the main opposition parties Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) are of the view that the BEC and the four-party coalition provincial government are not willing to allow future local governments to share power.

“The provincial government and election commission are denying the poor people of their constitutional and legal right,” accused Sajid Tareen, the BNP-M vice-president.

JUI-F’s reaction to the delay is equally bitter. Party spokesperson Jan Achakzai said JUI-F believes that the Election Commission of Pakistan has intentionally provided an opportunity to the ruling parties and affluent candidates to become mayors, which is why they want to rig the second and third phases of the LG polls. “In the second phase, reserved seats in the councils will be filled through indirect elections, while in the third phase, members of the councils will elect mayors and chairmen.”

He explains how easy it is for the elections to be rigged. Section 25 of the Balochistan Local Government Act, 2010 (as amended in August 2013) calls for holding LG polls in the province on a party basis. However, in clear violation of this provision, the ECP published only the list of returning candidates on is website on January 9 this year, without detailing their party affiliation or the results. Without party affiliation, results run a greater risk of being tampered with as rich and powerful candidates can try to influence members of the councils.

“We are thinking of going to the Balochistan High Court through a writ petition and seeking the court’s orders to direct ECP to make results public by detailing the party affiliation of those elected. They should also provide data regarding the number of votes obtained by candidates, invalid votes, total votes cast, total registered voters, and the breakdown of votes in respective polling stations.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 6^th, 2014.