WHEN the chief custodians of the democratic process — the ones elected to office via that very democratic process — show little regard for the constitutional and legal imperatives of their office, it is hardly surprising when other institutions of state intervene and order parliamentary leaders to do their job.

Since July 30, 2013, when Fakhruddin Ebrahim resigned from the post, the country has been without a permanent chief election commissioner.

To fill that post — occupied on an interim basis by now three successive justices of the Supreme Court — Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Khurshid Shah must agree on the names of three candidates, who must be drawn from the superior judiciary (serving or retired).

Thereafter, a special parliamentary committee must convene to select one of the three candidates as the next chief of the Election Commission of Pakistan. But that seemingly simple process has not yet taken place because it appears that neither the opposition nor the government is in a particular hurry to do so.

Quite why that is the case is one of those continuing mysteries that constitute the elected representatives’ cavalier attitude towards the very system that helps get them elected to public office.

It is though in every way unacceptable — and the Supreme Court is right to be vexed by the situation. For the Supreme Court, there are at least two problems the non-existence of a permanent ECP head has created.

One, a judge of the Supreme Court, usually the senior-most judge after the chief justice, is constitutionally required to be the acting commissioner — meaning that the Supreme Court is deprived of the full services of one judge.

It is also a cause of awkwardness for the court, given that electoral matters handled by the ECP are frequently litigated and reach the Supreme Court for adjudication.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court is suffering from the perception in some quarters that in certain matters the court has not been as forceful in ensuring the executive adheres to the letter and spirit of the Constitution as the court was, say, two or three years ago. In particular, the court’s long, thus far in vain, struggle to get provincial governments to hold local government elections is a sore point — and something the appointment of a permanent ECP chief could go some way to resolve.

The government and the PPP, meanwhile, have resorted to the fig leaf of suggesting they want to finish the process of electoral reforms first — an excuse that would be more credible if either side showed any interest in getting the reforms process under way.

With the PTI seemingly determined to trigger via resignations a spate of by-elections, a permanent ECP head has become all the more important. Will parliament nominate one by Nov 13 or force the Supreme Court into the unpleasantness of withdrawing the acting commissioner?

Published in Dawn, November 1st , 2014