KARACHI, July 6: The PPP Sindh chapter has drawn the chief election commissioner’s attention to the violation of election laws allegedly by the chief minister and his coalition partners, and sought the CEC’s indulgence in ensuring free and fair elections for local bodies. “The coalition and the CM are blatantly violating directives of the election commission which is full-fledged pre-poll rigging,” MNA Fahmida Mirza, provincial information secretary of the party, alleged on Wednesday referring to transfers and postings of police officials on a large scale by Chief Minister Arbab Rahim. She pointed out that this had been resorted to even after the announcement of the election schedule and issuance of the EC’s orders banning such actions.

Dr Fahmida Mirza said that several police officers had been transferred and posted in Badin and Thatta, while more than 52 transfers and postings in police department had been enacted on the provincial level after the announcement of elections.

She pointed out that as many as 45 police officials, including DPO (Operation) and DPO (Investigation) Hyderabad, as well as TPOs of Lateefabad, Hyderabad City, SITE, Thatta and Mirpur Bathoro, had been transferred. Dozens of SHOs had also been replaced in Mirpurkhas, Hyderabad, Badin, and Thatta, she added.

The PPP leader observed that Dr Arbab had been disregarding the assurances given by Gen Pervez Musharraf and his Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz who were talking about level-playing field. In this context, she claimed that the chief minister was going district to district to hurl threats upon voters of PPP and other opposition parties’ candidates.

Dr Mirza urged the Election Commission of Pakistan to exercise its powers to see that not a single transfer was made in this province.

She also pointed out that a junior had been posted as DIG Larkana while senior DPOs were also being made to work under junior officers. She urged the ECP to order cancellation of all these transfers and ensure implementation of its order.