Rigging allegations: PML-N questions credibility of local government elections

The party accused the PPP of manipulating the process

KARACHI: Pakistan Muslim League — Nawaz (PML-N) has rejected the first phase of the local government elections held in the upper parts of Sindh on Saturday, claiming that the ruling Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) has manipulated the election process.

Addressing a press conference at the Karachi Press Club on Sunday, PML-N Sindh president Mohammad Ismail Rahoo said that his party had already raised questions of law and order and asked the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to deploy paramilitary forces at the polling stations.

"It is merely rigging and nothing else," said Rahoo. He said that his party workers will stage a sit-in outside the ECP office in Karachi on November 7 against the recent elections in Sindh.

He said that Sindh chief minister considers the elections peaceful despite the killing of over a dozen people in Khairpur district on the first day of the elections.

Rahoo claimed that the Sindh government had changed returning officers on the night of the elections. "We demand deployment of Rangers and army at polling stations during the next phases," he added.

Rahoo was accompanied by PML-N Sindh chapter vice president Shah Mohammad Shah, Senator Nehal Hashmi and other party leaders. They announced that PML-N will host the All Parties Conference (APC) in Karachi on November 5. Rahoo said that the APC will be attended by some leaders of the PPP as well.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 2^nd, 2015.