February 15, 2007	Thursday	Muharram 26, 1428

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ISLAMABAD, Feb 14: The Election Commission of Pakistan has said that recent by-polls for a National Assembly seat in Karachi and a Provincial Assembly seat in Jamshoro were held in a “free and fair manner”.

The commission rejected the allegations of misconduct by the Pakistan People’s Party as unfounded.

In a statement issued here on Wednesday, Election Commission Secretary Kanwar Mohammad Dilshad said the by-elections were held under the supervision of judiciary in which the election commission had appointed the district and sessions judges as the district returning officers and the additional district and sessions judges as returning officers.

On allegation that the list of polling staff was not provided to the PPP candidate, the secretary clarified that such list had never been provided to any contesting candidates.

Only the list of polling stations is notified and published in the official gazette by the district returning officer 15 days before the polling day.

Regarding commission’s silence on complaints of disruption or harassment at the polling stations, he said about 70 complaints had been received by the election commission secretariat from 10:12 am to 6:52 pm on the polling day.

As soon as the complaints were received, they were sent to the Sindh chief secretary for immediate action while the copies of the letters addressed to the chief secretary were also endorsed to Bilawal House.

The Inspector-General of Sindh Police was also directed by the chief election commissioner to submit his report on incidents of firing near polling stations and the action was taken against the culprits by law-enforcement agencies.

The secretary rejected allegations that election duties in 36 polling stations were performed by some other persons and not by the assistant presiding officers deputed by the commission.

He said a report had been called from the district returning officer in this regard.

Six monitoring teams were deputed by the CEC to observe the elections proceedings.

These monitoring teams have already submitted their reports stating that the polling commenced in a peaceful manner during which all polling agents of all contesting candidates were present in the polling booths.

The signatures of the polling agents were also obtained and were available on record.

No untoward incident occurred inside the polling stations except two incidents of firing which were outside the vicinity of the polling stations and the polling process continued uninterrupted during the polling hours, he explained.