ISLAMABAD: On the heels of its failure to ensure timely general polls in the country, the electoral entity has now announced that it will unfreeze the voter lists, which were frozen on July 20, this year, for the general elections that were never held within the stipulated period.
In this context, the poll body said on Thursday said the voter lists or electoral rolls would stay unfrozen or open to modification till October 25.
In electoral terms, the word “freeze” implies that no changes can be made in the voter lists once the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) decides to freeze them— and unfreezing the voter lists makes them open to relevant changes involving voters’ data.
On June 19, this year, the ECP, in a meeting, decided to freeze the voter lists for general elections on July 13 keeping in view that the scheduled date for the National Assembly to complete its five-year term was falling a month later—on August 12 midnight. But, the poll body, on July 13, extended this deadline till July 20.
Section 39(1) of the Elections Act 2017 provides that no revision of, or correction in, an electoral roll of an electoral area, or inclusion or transfer of a vote from the electoral roll of an electoral area to the electoral roll of another electoral area, shall be made in respect of any electoral roll during the period beginning 30 days before the day on which the term of an assembly or a local government is due to expire till announcement of the related election(s) result(s).
The NA was dissolved on August 9, three days prior to the scheduled completion of its term. Punjab Assembly was dissolved on January 14 and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on January 18, this year.
Sindh Assembly stood dissolved on August 11 and Balochistan Assembly on August 12.
Constitutionally, keeping in view the NA dissolution date, the cut-off date to hold the general elections within the 90-day period is November 7, this year.
However, last week, the ECP announced that the general elections in the country would be held in the last week of January next year, without giving any specific date in this regard.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
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