February Polls
ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has established 38 teams to verify crucial documents related to the February 8 elections, which have been uploaded on its official website.
This decision was made under the directive of Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja, as stated in an office order. The order outlines that the teams are tasked with ensuring that all Forms-45 and Forms-46 are properly uploaded according to the final list of polling stations.
These teams have been directed to identify any missing Forms-45 and Forms-46 and provide detailed information on these gaps using a specific form supplied by the Elections Wing.
In addition, they are responsible for flagging any unreadable forms and confirming the accurate uploading of Forms-47, 48, and 49 for all constituencies. The ECP has given the teams a strict deadline of seven days to complete the verification process.
The order detailing this verification process was issued discreetly and has neither been made available on the ECP’s website nor officially communicated to the media. The document does not specify the reasons for initiating this review, but it follows a recent controversy involving the ECP.
About two months ago, it was revealed that the commission had “modified” the results of at least 41 constituencies in the national and provincial assemblies of Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
These modifications were carried out on July 3 and 4, involving updates to Forms-45 stored on the ECP’s official Google Drive. The lack of clarity regarding the nature of these modifications raised questions about the transparency of the electoral process.
A closer examination of the ECP’s Google Drive data on July 3 showed that Forms-45 were missing for 14 provincial assembly constituencies in Lahore. In their place, Forms-46 were uploaded. This issue was particularly evident in NA-125, a constituency in Lahore, where around 50 Forms-45 were missing.
However, starting from July 4, these missing forms began to appear on the ECP’s Google Drive. By July 5, the missing forms for NA-125 and the 14 other provincial assembly constituencies were uploaded, including those for PP-146, PP-148, PP-150, PP-151, PP-154, PP-156, PP-159, PP-160, PP-162, PP-164, PP-166, PP-170, PP-172, and PP-173.
Several high-profile constituencies were among those affected by the data modifications, such as PP-159, the seat of Punjab Chief Minister Maryam Nawaz, and PP-164, vacated by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. Another affected seat, PP-150, was won by Aleem Khan of the Istehkam-i-Pakistan Party.
Beyond Lahore, the ECP also modified data for 26 other constituencies in Punjab and KP. In Punjab, these included NA-99, NA-101, NA-103, NA-104 (Faisalabad), NA-118, NA-121 (Lahore), NA-136, NA-138 (Okara), and others.
Additionally, data was updated for provincial assembly seats such as PP-22 (Chakwal), PP-23 (Talagang), PP-108 (Faisalabad), PP-186, PP-187 (Okara), PP-197 (Pakpattan), and PP-213 (Multan).
In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, the data updates affected eight constituencies, including NA-2, NA-3, NA-35, PK-5, PK-7, PK-8, PK-9, and PK-10, all of which were won by PTI-backed candidates. These updates and the subsequent verification teams’ formation underscore the ECP’s ongoing efforts to address concerns related to electoral transparency and integrity.
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