KARACHI, May 3: Elections and their results have been a cause of concern for the establishment for long. Be it elections on the basis of political parties or not, the politics of the country has always been restricted to a handful of influentials and their families.

Zaffarullah Khan, trainer of the one-day workshop, Political Reporting: Challenges From the Field, said this while briefing participants of the training workshop about the history of the country’s elections. The workshop was organised by the Women Media Centre in collaboration with the National Endowment for Democracy, USA.

The purpose of the programme was to create awareness among aspiring and professional journalists to understand the set-up of the electoral procedure and its necessities. It also meant to encourage young women to opt for political reporting, as it was one of the fields where they were looked upon as personae non grata.

Mr Khan, while outlining what had happened in past elections, said that “it was evident that the establishment, from day one, was not pleased with the concept of elections.

‘‘This concern of theirs got worse when one seasoned politician was defeated by a student leader, while another by a labour union leader,” he said.

Salahuddin Haider, a senior journalist by profession, joined the workshop in the second session. Mr Haider emphasised the role of journalists in society and what should be their code of conduct.

Out of the 51 female participants, many were students while others were media persons. They were asked to work on various cases regarding election procedures. The participants were given certificates at the end of the programme.