That the news of Commissioner Rawalpindi Liaquat Chatha claiming that Feb 8 election results were “manipulated” under his watch in the entire Rawalpindi Division has come as a bombshell is a fact. Never before in the history of the country has any bureaucrat of such stature or seniority challenged or eroded the credibility of an election in which his subordinates such as assistant commissioners and deputy commissioner performed the duties of Returning Officers (ROs) and Deputy Returning Officers (DROs).
Demanding punishment to all those, including himself, who were involved in rigging elections, Chatha says he will cooperate whole-heartedly and unreservedly with any committee that is formed to investigate the claims that he has made. It is not known whatever Chatha has said is truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. The question whether or not the former commissioner Rawalpindi has been suffering from serious mental illness as claimed by Rana Sanaullah of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), describing the former as his “very old friend” has no definitive answer.
Ironically, however, many of those who are now terming a senior public servant a “mental case”, “lunatic bureaucrat”, etc, had gleefully and obligingly attended his son’s wedding. Moreover, it was in September 2022 that PML-N vice president Maryam Nawaz heaped a lot of praise on Liaquat Chatha, describing him as “pride of Pakistan”. Be that as it may, the fact remains that Chatha’s claim constitutes a wild allegation, which has lent a highly valuable support to all those voices that have rejected the Feb 8 elections and demanded holding of elections afresh. Hence the need for a high-level, thorough and impartial investigation into his claims or allegations that he made at a press conference yesterday while announcing that he had resigned from his position of Commissioner Rawalpindi Division. Needless to say, whatever he has done has immensely added to the political and economic uncertainty in the country.
Raja Afrasyab, Rawalpindi
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024