ISLAMABAD: A parliamentary committee opposed on Wednesday the power of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to modify the final list of constituencies on its own and decided to bring suitable amendment to the law to rescind that authority.

Under Section 10-A of the Delimitation of Constituencies Act, 1974, the ECP may, at any time, make such amendments, alterations or modifications in the final list of constituencies or in areas included in a constituency, as it deems necessary.

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The sub-committee of the parliamentary committee on electoral reforms which met here on Wednesday with Federal Minister for Science and Technology Zahid Hamid in the chair was of the view that the section should be re-phrased to take away the absolute power from the commission.

The clause appears in the draft unified electoral law as part of principles of delimitation.

Informed sources told Dawn that the issue had been raised in a previous meeting by Farooq H. Naek, former law minister and former chairman of Senate, and came under discussion in Wednesday’s meeting.

The ECP representatives were of the view that any amendment to section 10-A of Delimitation of Constituencies Act would affect the ECP’s autonomy. It was pointed out that the ECP could not have re-described constituencies prior to 2008 and 2012 general polls in the absence of this section.

Later, Minister for Science and Technology Zahid Hamid told reporters that the committee had decided to take away the power of the ECP to alter constituencies on its own. He said it would be possible for the commission to do it only on a proposal, but he did not elaborate.

The minister, who is the convener of the sub-committee, said that the National Database Registration Authority (Nadra) and the ECP would be linked and a person having secured a computerised national identity card would automatically become a voter.

He said those registered as voters would be intimated by the ECP that they had been enrolled as voters. He said the secretary of each local council shall submit the list of deceased people of that council on a prescribed form to the registration officer concerned on a quarterly basis.

He said the committee recommended immediate holding of census. He said the law was very clear and the National Assembly seats in a province were allocated on the basis of census.

Published in Dawn, November 6th , 2014