Following ECP’s termination of ROs’ training, PML-N charges PTI of plotting to postpone elections

According to Shehbaz, bureaucracy assumed DRO responsibilities in 2018.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) was accused by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Thursday of hating a plot to postpone the general elections scheduled for February 8.

Shehbaz Sharif, the president of the PML-N, claimed in a statement on Thursday that the PTI was planning to postpone the general elections, which were supposed to take place on February 8 of next year.

The PML-N president referred to the PTI’s lawsuit in the Lahore High Court (LHC) challenging the appointment of district returning officers (DROs) from bureaucracy and said the plea amounted to undermining the right of people to be represented.

“The High Court petition filed by the PTI is a scheme to evade the elections. Similar to cipher, PTI is planning a plot to rig the general elections scheduled for February 8. He declared, “As usual, the PTI is acting hypocritically and with a double standard in this situation.

The former prime minister added that the PTI was openly calling for elections to be held on time while submitting court petitions to delay the voting.

Even during the 2018 elections, DRO responsibilities were handled by bureaucracy. The PTI then did not object to bureaucratic DROs carrying out their duties,” he said, adding that the PTI would bear responsibility if the elections scheduled for February 8, 2024 were postponed.

Shehbaz stated, “[…] now the PTI has adopted the same hypocrisy elections.” The PTI, he claimed, had taken different positions on the cipher controversy both in public and during the investigation. “A similar conspiracy related to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) program” was the PTI’s doing, according to him.

He claimed that by inciting a constitutional crisis in the nation, the PTI aimed to sow political unrest. He insisted that the PTI did not want the nation to have a robust economy or for people to be out of poverty.

Faisal Karim Kundi, the leader of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), questioned why a political party would advocate for postponing elections if it professed to be so big.

In addition, he attacked the National Accountability Bureau (NAB), claiming that political engineering was its primary function. He claimed that the same NAB that had filed charges against former prime minister Nawaz Sharif was now clearing him in case after case.

Read More: Due to the LHC order, ECP stops training DROs and ROs

“The general public ought to be informed that the NAB is incorrect either now or in the past. It is an institution, not someone’s private property, he declared.

In the meantime, in compliance with the LHC order, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has ceased providing training to returning officers (ROs) and district returning officers (DROs) appointed for the next general elections.

The commission has ordered that DROs and ROs no longer receive training on the LHC order, an ECP spokesperson announced in a notification on Thursday.

The election commissioners of Punjab, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and Balochistan have received the notification. It informed that DRO and RO training was being conducted in Quetta, Karachi, Lahore, and Peshawar.

Prior to the general elections on February 8 of the following year, the ECP order requesting ROs from bureaucracy was suspended by the high court.

In response to a petition filed by the PTI, Justice Ali Baqir Najafi announced his reserved verdict, referred the case to the chief justice of the LHC, and suggested creating a larger bench to hear the case.

Before the one-judge LHC bench, petitioner Umair Niazi argued that the Election Commission had contacted the government to return officers and that it was unreasonable to expect fair and transparent elections from a caretaker administration. He asked the judge to set aside the ECP’s notification.