August 19, 2006	Saturday	Rajab 23, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Aug 18: The People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) on Friday asked the chief election commissioner (CEC) to update the voters list used in the general elections 2002, instead of preparing a new one for the 2007 polls.

The demand was made by PPP Sindh secretary general Nafees Siddiqi, MNA Manzoor Wassan and party’s media coordinator Nazir Dhoki while speaking at a news conference.

Mr Siddiqi said there was no justification for preparing new list as two lists were already with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

He said there was a list which was used in the 2002 elections, then the ECP prepared another list for the local government elections and now it intended to make a third one. He said the preparation of voters list was an example of the pre- poll rigging as the party had serious reservations about the whole exercise.

He said the ECP had announced that both old and new national identity cards (NICs) were valid for registration of voters. There is a chance that a person could get his name entered in the list from different areas by using his old and new NICs, he added.

Mr Siddiqi said the National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) had already stated that there were 20 million people in the country without the new computerised identity cards. He alleged that the ECP staff was not distributing the registration forms in the areas which were considered to be the strongholds of the opposition parties.

He said a PPP delegation also called on the Sindh election commissioner and highlighted the issue, but to no avail.

The PPP leader said the party strongly believed that free and fair elections were not possible under Gen Pervez Musharraf. He said cracks had already appeared in the government ranks.

He predicted that the government would not be there by the end of the present year. He said Gen Musharraf seemed to be the president of the Pakistan Muslim League (PML) and not Pakistan.

He said being the army chief it was not appropriate for Gen Musharraf to interfere in party affairs.

Mr Siddiqi said the people of Sindh had never been given a chance to elect their representatives and each time a chief minister had been imposed on the people by Punjab. He said that the people should be informed as to what were the demands of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) when its ministers submitted resignations and what package they had been offered by Gen Musharraf.

He said the law and order situation in Sindh had become worst and incidents of vehicles and mobile phone snatching had become a routine.

Mr Siddiqi said the recent rains in Karachi had exposed the city government’s performance. He said the city government had dug up all roads of the city in the name of construction of by- passes causing serious sanitation problem during the rains. He said even the roads constructed by the Frontier Works Organisation (FWO) had been destroyed.

Manzoor Wassan said the Musharraf regime was only busy in damaging the federation and creating hatred among the federating units. He said Gen Musharraf would prove to be a Gorbachev for Pakistan and the country would face the fate of Russia if the present regime allowed to continue.