Parliamentary panel approves Elections Bill 2017 amid reservations

20 Jul, 2017

The Parliamentary Committee on Electoral Reforms has approved Elections Bill 2017 amidst reservations of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Jamaat-e-Islami (JI). Minister for Finance Muhammad Ishaq Dar chaired the 25th in-camera meeting of the committee here on Wednesday. At the end of the meeting, Dar informed the media that the committee had approved Elections Bill 2017 unanimously.
He claimed that the draft of Elections Bill 2017 was approved with consensus and would have signature of all political parties by Friday. He said that the bill has been finalised in consultation with stakeholders - Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and mainstream political parties. He said that the subcommittee of Electoral Reforms Committee held more than 90 meetings and reviewed all the legal and constitutional aspects of the Elections Bill 2017 in consultation with political parties, ECP and other relevant departments.
Member committee belonging to PTI, Dr Shireen Mehrunnisa Mazari said that the government forced them to walk out from the proceedings of the electoral reforms committee as it did not accommodate their recommendations in letter and spirit. She said that the PTI has been pursuing the government to introduce certain amendments in the bill and it (government) was not listening to them in this regard, adding the party will decide its strategy after holding a party meeting.
Another member, Sahibzada Tariq Ullah belonging to JI said that the PTI had expressed its serious concerns over non-serious attitude of the government in introducing electronic voting machines as well as the right to vote for overseas Pakistanis in general election 2018.
He further said that the JI had reservations over the condition related to 10 percent women voters in any constituency. There is a proposal under consideration to cancel results of any constituency where less than 10 percent women votes are cast. However, some mainstream political parties are averse to this proposal and want this percentage to be lowered.
Later, in a press conference, Chairman PTI Imran Khan said that the incumbent ECP has compromised. He argued that overseas Pakistanis should be allowed to vote in the next election and biometric system should be introduced for voting. Khan further demanded that the caretaker government should be unbiased in holding elections. He lambasted the ECP at a time when the commission is hearing disqualification references against him.

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