New electoral reforms—I

Reforms are a process of improvement whereby political institutions are revitalized for better performance and efficiency. Usually reforms are undertaken after a thorough study and analysis of an existing system and areas are identified which require reforms.

The greatest institution in human history is democracy whereby people freely choose their representatives to govern them. These representatives exercise power as a trust and make decisions for the polity through a deliberative process based on collective wisdom, legitimacy and reflection. Reforms in the elective process are a difficult job and like a machine in order to obtain maximum efficiency change of parts needs to be carefully made (leviathan).

Democracy ended centuries of exploitation in the name of religion and hereditary claims to power. It opened up vistas of freedoms of multiple kinds that paved the way for the progress and development of human race.

The path to free and egalitarian society ensuring economic, social and political justice goes through a land that is irrigated by the blood and toil of human sacrifices for the larger objectives set out by them in the constitutions they adopt, which need to be continuously protected from external attacks and internal decay.

A charter of rights or a constitution promising democratic representative institutions are however meaningless unless the people for whom they are made are ready and willing to protect them and guard them against manipulations. Any reforms in the electoral system are thus to be judged on the criterion whether they are a step in line with the declared objectives in the constitution.

The Constitution of Pakistan provides for representative government(s) through free and fair elections to achieve the ethos of the Constitution set out in its preamble. Parliament is empowered to enact enabling laws to achieve the said objective.

The Elections Act, 2017 has been amended by way of two significant amendments. These amendments provide for the use of electronic voting machines (EVMs) and replace the manual voting system that required ballot papers and a complicated system of counting, verification and confirmation of elections results. It was believed with the human involvement in the election process, fairness of elections got compromised.

Now with lesser involvement of officials at several steps of elections and with the introduction of EVMs elections will become free and fair. Support for EVMs comes from the PTI (Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf) government. Opposition to EVMs came from two main political parties, PPPP (Pakistan People’s Party Parliamentarians) and PML-N (Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz) and some smaller parties.

The precise argument in favour of EVMs as formulated by the PTI is that previously its opposing parties, PPPP and PML (N), used to get registered bogus votes, they had connections in bureaucracy and due to their past manipulation of the manual system of voting there was a greater possibility of rigging, and manipulation and hijacking of elections, which will come to an end through use of EVMs.

The opposition, on the other hand, insists that PTI having lost its popular support due to its wrong policies, particularly the price hike and economic mismanagement, most likely would be defeated in elections. EVMs are meant to be used to rig and manipulate elections in their favour, according to them. They give examples of by-elections in the Punjab and other provinces where PTI lost and its workers were allegedly found involved in rigging (Daska). Thus, PTI got these amendments made to rig the future elections.

Similarly, the right to vote given to overseas Pakistanis along with the EVMs was meant to help PTI increase its support by showing a huge number of votes cast in its favour through EVMs. Thus, by taking this instance grounds have been laid to dispute the future elections.

Elections in Pakistan have always been disputed. It is said that the elections of 1970 were free and fair but the results were not honoured and Pakistan got dismembered. Elections of 1977 resulted in the imposition of martial law. After that, almost every election has been disputed.

There are two reasons for this distrust and dispute over election results. In the first instance, the establishment (civil and military) are always interested in the election and their results. Thus, in all the previous elections since 1985, they had a greater role in the election results and in the formation and dismissal of those governments.

Reasons for this interference in the electoral process and in the formation of governments have to do with the history which shows that the permanent institutions were unwilling to submit to the civilian authority because they doubt their wisdom, integrity and competence. It would be seen that from the very beginning, some sort of legal regime was in place to disqualify public representatives on multiple grounds. From 1947 to 1970, general elections were delayed. In this area of disqualification now any opposition to the ideology of Pakistan, as articulated by the establishment, was a ground for disqualification.

Rather than insisting on the loyalty to the state, the disqualification of members of Parliament for their opposition to various ambiguous ideologies and institutions unfortunately created mistrust, uncertainty and fear amongst the people of different nationalities and undermined cohesion and cementing of the federation. Resultantly, the democratic process could not take off. In this scenario, the establishment got a permanent role in the electoral process. It continues to have a bigger role in different ways.

(To be continued)

(The writer is Advocate Supreme Court and a former Additional Attorney-General for Pakistan)

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021