ISLAMABAD: PTI wants access to ECP’s main server to verify its members’ details before the intra-party elections.

The party’s chief election commissioner (CEC), Tasneem Noorani, filed a petition with the Islamabad High Court asking for access to the ECP server.

The petition said PTI’s experience of registering their voters by filling out cards had been unpleasant. It says prospective candidates have, at times, taken data from information available on hard copies of the ECP’s electoral lists and faked their membership details.

PTI has decided to register their voters via cell phones on the basis of ‘One phone one vote’, and asks them to submit their names and CNIC numbers, the petition further says.

This data can be texted to the telephone short code 9008 that has been allotted to PTI by the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA). The party’s main server will then register the details of the voter.

The PTI claims that the law does not prohibit the ECP to allow access to its servers for verifying voters’ details. The party says it is not asking for data that is classified or sensitive.

PTI asks the court to direct the ECP to help the party so that its efforts to hold credible intra-party elections will not go to waste.

Published in Dawn, November 10th, 2015