ISLAMABAD: With by-elections in some National and provincial assembly constituencies in Punjab and polling for the first phase of local government elections in Punjab and Sindh only days away, the Election Commission (ECP) Secretary Babar Yaqoob Fateh Muhammad came up with a warning on Saturday of swift action against any violations of the code of conduct.

“The code of conduct has been given the status of an order and its violation will [be treated as] contempt of court,” he told a group of reporters.

He said that violations would entail penalties and punishment under Section 204 of the constitution – dealing with powers of the superior courts to punish any person who abuses, interferes with or obstructs the process of the court in any way or disobeys any order of the court, and Section 103-A of the Representation of Peoples Act (ROPA), 1976, which gives powers to the ECP to punish for contempt.

Section 103-A of the ROPA reads: “The commission shall have the same power as the High Court has to punish any person for contempt of court and the Contempt of Court Act, 1976 (XLIV of 1976), shall have effect accordingly as if reference therein to a ‘court’ and to a ‘judge’ were a reference, respectively, to the ‘commission’ [and the commissioner or, as the case may be, a member of the commission].”

The ECP secretary said all arrangements for by-polls in NA-122 (Lahore), NA-144 (Okara), PP-147 (Lahore) and PP-16 (Attock) had been finalised. He said foolproof security arrangements had been made and army and Rangers personnel would be deployed inside and outside polling stations.

He said the coming LG polls would be closely monitored and a meeting of the ECP would take place on Monday (Oct 5) for a final review of the arrangements.

The meeting will take place a day before by-polls in PP-16 (Attock), a seat that had fallen vacant following the assassination of former Punjab home minister Shuja Khanzada. Polling in the other three constituencies will be held on Oct 11.

Meanwhile, as many as 22.69 million registered voters from 27 districts of Punjab and Sindh will be able to exercise their right to franchise in the second phase of local government elections.

According to statistics released by the ECP on Saturday, the number of registered voters in 12 districts of Punjab – to be covered in the second phase of LG polls — is 14.68m, while the number of voters in 15 districts of Sindh comes to a little over 8m.

Earlier, the ECP had released the number of registered voters in 12 districts of Punjab and eight districts of Sindh to be covered in the first phase of LG polls in the two provinces.

Published in Dawn, October 4th, 2015

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