NOW that the matter of PTI’s reserved seats stands resolved, there are several equally pressing issues pertaining to the recent general election that need attention. Foremost among them is the question of how quickly and fairly the dozens of petitions pending before election tribunals can be resolved. In their separate verdicts on the reserved seats case, the judges of the Supreme Court, including the chief justice, have noted that the ECP acted unlawfully by disbarring the PTI from contesting the Feb 8 election. Many have seen the judgement as a ‘damning indictment’ of the ECP’s decisions. The question naturally arises: can this ECP be trusted to ensure that election tribunals will dispense justice fairly and in a timely manner, especially after it was recently gifted legal powers to appoint retired judges of its own choosing to oversee them? The answer, after recent experiences, is a resounding ‘no’ from most observers. In fact, there are now growing calls for the chief election commissioner, as well as the provincial commissioners, to resign and take responsibility for one of the most controversial general elections in recent memory. Constitutional body or not, the ECP has clearly lost the public’s trust.

The second question pertains to the Senate elections, which were conducted after the ECP, in violation of the Constitution, handed over the PTI’s share of reserved seats to other parties. Naturally, this action affected the outcome of the Senate elections by giving rival parties more votes than they deserved. Though most legal experts believe that the Supreme Court’s judgement will have no bearing on the Senate elections due to certain technicalities, this does not seem very fair. If the ECP’s illegal and unconstitutional decisions thwarted the public will and distorted the mandate given to each party by the people, then, for the sake of democracy, this injustice, too, must be undone. However, the process needs to begin with closer scrutiny of all contested results before the election tribunals, as it must be determined where and how far the ECP deviated from established rules and procedures for there to be greater clarity on how much of the public’s mandate was distorted by its decisions. The idea must be to set a precedent that forever dissuades any institution from interfering in the democratic process based on arbitrary decisions made by a few individuals.

Published in Dawn, July 15th, 2024