Member of opposition parties in National assembly has sought sweeping changes to the electoral reforms bill that was tabled in the lower house of parliament for discussion. According to report, the opposition MNAs found some parts of the Election Bill 2017 to be against the cultural and ethical norms of the country. Taking part in the discussion on the draft bill, Syed Naveed Qamar of PPPP suggested improvement in the quality of ballot papers, by implying watermark in it. He also called for providing conveyance to voters on the polling day. While the proposed bill restricts candidates from providing conveyance facility to voters, Qamar said the voters living in rural areas needed transport to take them to the polling station. Dr Shireen Mazari of the PTI said that her party still had reservations over the bill. Mazari said elections would not be transparent if four demands of her party were not met. She said that overseas Pakistanis should be given the right to vote otherwise the elections would be meaningless. She also demanded reconstitution of the Election Commission of Pakistan for holding the coming elections as, according to her, no transparent election could be conducted in the presence of the current commission. Her fourth point was about biometric verification of voters. SA Iqbal Qadri of the MQM said that increasing the limit of election expenses and removing slab on the parties by enabling them to spend unlimited funds on elections would eliminate financially poor political parties. Sahibzada Tariq Ullah of the JI warned against touching Articles 62 and 63 of the Constitution, he said their removal would create anarchy in the country.
The Election Bill 2017 had been finalised by major political parties after extensive deliberations and it had also taken long time. The Bill was tabled in National Assembly following ECP’s letter in which it was asked to pass the bill as soon as possible so that arrangements could be made to hold the upcoming elections under new law. It would be better if all political parties evolved consensus on the Bill. At this stage political parties should avoid creating hurdles in the smooth passage of the bill. They should recommend changes when it was being deliberated in parliamentary committees. The process should be completed on urgent basis so that ECP could get time to implement this law to conduct free, fair and transparent elections.
