ISLAMABAD: Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfraz Bugti on Monday filed a petition with the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP), seeking postponement of local government elections in Quetta that were scheduled to be held on December 28.

Informed sources told Dawn that Mr Bugti cited the ‘precarious law and order situation’ in the provincial capital and the suspension of internet services as the reasons for postponing the Quetta Metropolitan Corporation (QMC) elections.

He also said people have migrated due to winter, affecting voter turnout.

Earlier, the Balochistan government had requested the election commission to postpone the polls, giving reasons similar to those stated in today’s petition. The request was turned down.

Chief minister says 51pc of households in Balochistan live below poverty line

In other districts of Balochistan, local government elections were held three years ago, and the current bodies’ term would expire in nine months, the sources said. The ECP completed all preparations for holding local bodies elections in Quetta, and the printing of ballot papers was currently underway.

On October 6, a bench of the Balochistan High Court (BHC) rejected constitutional petitions filed by numerous individuals seeking postponement of the elections and directed the election commissioner of Balochistan to hold the local government elections as soon as possible.

In view of the BHC orders, the election commission had started preparation for holding elections in Quetta and announced the schedule for it on November 13.

Elections would be held in 172 union councils and 641 wards of the city, with 2,710 candidates contesting polls in Quetta district.

The previous local bodies, elected in 2015, completed their tenure on January 27, 2019. Under the Elections Act, 2017, local government elections should be held within 120 days after the expiry of the term. However, the polls were held in May 2022, more than three years after the expiry of the previous term.

The delay primarily resulted from a lack of consensus among political parties over proposed amendments to the Balochistan Local Government Act (BLGA), 2010, and issues concerning the delimitation of constituencies.

The LG elections in two major districts with sizeable urban populations in the province, Quetta and Lasbela, were delayed because of issues with the delimitation of wards. While the LG elections in Lasbela were held at the end of 2022, elections in Quetta could not be held due to pending litigation in the BHC over the delimitation of wards in the district.

51pc households live below poverty line

Meanwhile, speaking at a symposium on Monday, the Balochistan chief minister said that 51 per cent of households in the province live below the poverty line while 71 per cent of the population suffers from multidimensional poverty.

The symposium, Sustainable Deve­lopment and Environmental Resilience in Balochistan, was organised by the Planning and Development Department of the Balochistan government in Islam­abad on Monday.

He said the province has faced droughts, unusual rainfall, floods, extreme heat waves, and other climatic irregularities, with poor and vulnerable groups being the hardest hit in recent years.

Mr Bugti said climate change is the biggest challenge facing the world today, but asserted that despite its direct and severe impact, Balochistan is steadily progressing on the path of sustainable development.

i Published in Dawn, December 9th, 2025