October 8, 2002	Tuesday	Sha’aban 1, 1423

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LANDI KOTAL, Oct 7: With the general elections just round the corner, electioneering in Khyber Agency has intensified as tough contest is expected between rival candidates from NA-45 and NA- 46.

In both the Khyber Agency constituencies, candidates are now relying more on big rallies and public meetings to reach out to a maximum number of voters.

Initially, they started their door-to-door campaign — a new thing in the tribal area.

Before the Feb 1997 elections, only tribal maliks and elders were eligible to vote. This time the number of voters in the NA-45 constituency is 91,361, out of which 28,974 are women, and NA-46 has 80,422 voters with 16,092 women.

Ironically, the number of total voters has decreased for both the constituencies. For the Feb 1997 elections there were a total of 189,533 registered voters.

At the time, the entire Khyber Agency was one national assembly constituency. Tribals were granted the right to vote on adult franchise basis during the 1997 elections.

The details received from the election commission show a decrease in the number of voters i.e. 17,750, from both the Khyber agency constituencies, as now the total number of registered voters for NA-45 and NA-46 is 171,783.

For the Oct 10 general and provincial assembly elections, the voter-age limit has also been reduced from 21 to 18 years, and going by that criteria, the number of voters in Khyber Agency should also have increased.

When asked about the shortfall in the number of registered voters in Khyber, an official at the provincial election commission office told Dawn that the shortfall was because of migrations from tribal areas to the settled districts. But his argument seemed weightless as almost all tribals settled in Peshawar or elsewhere had their names registered in their respective tribal agencies.

Meanwhile, the election commission has completed its arrangements for holding elections in Khyber Agency. A total of 181 polling stations would be established in both constituencies with 97 in NA-45 and 84 in NA-46. The total number of polling booths, both male and female for NA-45 will be 210, and in the NA-46, there would be 84 polling booths.

The EC has also employed a total of 971 polling staff for election duties on Oct 10. These temporary employees were given training in voting and election-related matters in Bara sub- division a week ago.

The EC has for the first time established polling stations in the remote areas of Maidan in Tirah valley and Sheen Pokh Kalay in Loe Shalman. A 65km road which is under construction to Maidan and Sheen Pokh Kalay could only be reached by boat as it is located across the Kabul River and is about 85km away from Landi Kotal, tehsil headquarters of Khyber Agency.

The EC, in collaboration with the political administration, has also made elaborate security arrangements for the holding of fair and peaceful elections in Khyber Agency. Assistant Election Commissioner, Khyber Saeed Gul Momand, informed Dawn that 3- to 10-member Khasadar and FC team would be deployed at every polling station. He said that full protection would be provided to women voters as it was there basic right.