Local polls: Disappointed candidates criticise ECP

District government officials, working as returning officers, were in the process of allotting election symbols to candidates for the local government elections when the election schedule was recalled by the Election Commission of Pakistan on Monday.

Jamal said that he had been following the election schedule for weeks, but it had been brought to a halt just when everything had been finalised. Jamal further said that he would not file a nomination next time as union councils and wards delimitations might just change again. The electoral exercise over the past two days had been in vain, he deplored.

Many candidates who had approached the returning officers to get their assigned election symbols expressed dissatisfaction with the Election Commission and government.

The returning officers had previously compiled a list of the final candidates after scrutiny by January 5. The nomination papers were issued by December 20 and submitted from December 22 to December 27.

The names of candidates were displayed by December 28 and objections could be filed by December 29. The scrutiny of nomination papers and publication of final lists were carried out from December 30 to January 4. Appeals against the acceptance and rejection of candidacies were to be heard by January 6 and 7.

In Lahore, 14,984 people had filed nominations and the nominations of 13,364 had been candidates accepted. The disposal of appeals took place from January 8 to January 11. The candidates were allowed to withdraw nominations by January 12.

The final list of contesting candidates and their symbols was to be published on January 13.

According to the initial schedule, January 30 would have been the polling day while results would have been declared by February 2.

On Monday, the Election Commission of Pakistan, through a notification, halted the local bodies’ election by recalling the schedule for elections announced on December 9.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 14^th, 2014.