Legality of LG polls in Capital: printing of ballot papers set to begin amidst confusion

The printing of ballot papers for the upcoming local government elections in Islamabad is set to begin during the current week amidst confusion over the legality of the polls scheduled for July 25. Uncertainty surrounding the local government elections in Islamabad scheduled for July 25 by the Supreme Court has deepened after Senate termed the elections 'inappropriate' without any legal cover.
Any amendments to the law at this stage will delay polling and any significant amendment, such as having party based elections, will require endorsement by the National Assembly. The opposition parties that have been advocating party-based polls have a majority in the Senate. In the current scenario, the entire electoral process would have to be reinitiated starting from inviting fresh nominations, an official of ECP told Business Recorder.
Former Secretary ECP said that it is not entirely clear as to who exactly is responsible for the uncertainty that surrounds the holding of the local government elections in Islamabad. The ECP is making preparations but it lacks a legislative mandate to do so because the Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government Bill, 2015, has not as yet been passed by the Senate.
The ECP is confident of holding the elections as it is implementing the Supreme Court judgement of March 6, 2015 wherein the court ordered that the ECP should go ahead with holding the polls in light of a draft law. At the time it was believed that the proposed law would be passed by Parliament within a couple of months thereby enabling the local government elections to be held on July 25 - the date fixed by the court. "The government has failed to get the bill passed in three and half months time which required a simple majority in the Senate", an official of ECP said. The election campaign in the capital city has almost halted as majority of candidates think that elections will not take place in Islamabad as per schedule.
The ECP has to print 42 million ballot papers for the July 25 elections and time is running short. If the legislators finally decide to hold elections on party basis, the election commission will have to re-initiate the entire exercise of printing the ballot papers, an official of ECP told Business Recorder.
The last local bodies' elections in the federal capital were held in 1992 in which the 12 union councils elected their representatives for four years. The union councils are Bhara Kahu, Phulgaran, Tuimer, Charah, Kirpa, Sihala, Koral, Rawat, Sohan, Tarlai, Kurri and Shah Allah Ditta. After Islamabad was given the status of an independent district on July 1, 1980, the Local Government and Rural Development Ministry held the first polls in 1980 followed by another in 1983, 1987 and 1992 under the local government ordinance 1979.
The federal government, however, discontinued holding the elections in Islamabad in the late '90s and did not announce the schedule even after the promulgation of the Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government (amendment) Ordinance 2002. The official of ECP said that it is not clear which ordinance is effective in Islamabad. He clarified that under the local government ordinance 1979, Islamabad was divided into urban and rural areas with the Capital Development Authority delivering services to all sectors in urban areas, while the rural areas, comprising 12 union councils, were run through the local bodies' system in the past.
If local government ordinance 2002 is intact, than at least a graduate possessing a bachelors degree in any discipline or any degree recognised as equivalent under any law for the time being in force, can contest election of a Nazim or Naib Nazim, he said.
The bill has yet to be deliberated in the Senate to inter-alia consider its validity qua- existence of duly promulgated laws: Capital Territory Local Government Ordinance, 1979, the Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government Ordinance, 2002 and the Islamabad Capital Territory Local Government Election Ordinance, 2002.