October 19, 2006	Thursday	Ramazan 25, 1427

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ISLAMABAD, Oct 18: The People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) on Wednesday rejected the ongoing voters’ registration process for the next general elections and alledged that the lists were not being prepared in transparent manner.

Speaking at a news conference, four PPP MNAs asked the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to immediately stop the process and improve the previous voters list, instead of preparing a new one.

“We reject this process and fraud and consider it a first step towards rigging the next general elections in the country,” said PPP MNA from Kasur Chaudhry Manzoor Ahmed while speaking at the news conference with Qamaruz Zaman Kaira from Gujrat, Khalid Iqbal Memon from Larkana and Syed Qurban Ali Shah from Mirpurkhas.

The PPP MNAs pointed out massive irregularities and mismanagement in registration of voters in their respective areas. They suggested that the ECP should use the data of the 1998 Census for updating the voters list.

They said the government had complete data of the people after visiting each and every house in the country during the 1998 census then why the ECP staff was wasting its time by visiting houses again to collect the data. They said that the ECP should automatically include the name of a person who had acquired the age of 18 years according to the 1998 Census.

Chaudhry Manzoor Ahmed said that the PPP would be affected most due to the faulty lists as most of its voters lived in rural areas where majority was uneducated. He claimed that the number of registered voters had been decreased in various areas in his constituency due to faulty process.

Qamaruz Zaman Kaira said that National Database and Registration Authority (Nadra) should ensure provision of computerized national identity cards (CNICs) to all the people by next year without charging them.