KARACHI: All necessary preparations have been made to hold local government election in seven of eight cantonment boards in the province which will elect 39 out of 208 candidates in the first polls in cantonment areas after a long interval of 17 years.

Election will not be held in the Pannu Aqil cantonment board as the two councillors for its as many wards have already been elected unopposed.

The Election Commission of Pakistan on Friday handed over election material, including ballot paper books, ballot boxes and stamps, to presiding officers concerned under the supervision of Rangers and army and directed army personnel be deployed at all polling stations to ensure a free, fair and transparent election.

Polling will start at 8am and continue without break till 5pm. Though the unofficial results would start coming out with the counting of votes at polling stations, the final result would be announced on April 28.

The number of registered voters in all seven cantonment boards is 426,699 including 198,983 female voters and a total of 191 polling stations have been set up including 28 in Hyderabad with 14 polling stations exclusively for women.

There are 25 candidates in the run for eight wards in Cantonment Board Hyderabad and the board’s chief executive officer, Omer Siddique Chaudhry, has been appointed as returning officer.

In two wards of Manora cantonment seven candidates are in the fray where its additional executive officer Abdul Wahab will act as returning officer. In five wards of Karachi cantonment, 21 candidates are vying for councillor’s office.

Its chief executive officer Hayat Mahar has been appointed as returning officer. There are 82 candidates in the run for 10 wards in Clifton cantonment where its chief executive officer Sharome Safdar has been made returning officer.

For 10 wards in Faisal cantonment, there are 37 candidates in the fray while its chief executive officer Asif Amir Khan and Additional DML & C Karachi Adil Rafi Siddiqui will be returning officer.

Twelve candidates are in the run for one ward of Korangi cantonment where its chief executive officer Abdul Latif Mari will act as returning officer while in three wards of Malir cantonment 24 hopefuls are in the run. The board’s chief executive officer Mohammad Farooq will be returning officer.

A total of 183 candidates are contesting for councillor’s offices in 31 wards of six cantonment boards in the city and of them most are contesting as independent candidates while a handful belongs to PPP, PML-N, MQM, PTI and JI.

In Karachi, total number of polling station comes to 153 with 714 polling booths including 353 for women.

The election commission has appointed 191 presiding officers, 714 assistant presiding officers and an equal number of polling officers besides 34 peons to conduct election in a smooth manner.

Published in Dawn, April 25th, 2015

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