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ISLAMABAD, May 5: President Gen Musharraf‘s announcement on Saturday that the polling arrangements in the October election should be similar to those that were made in the referendum was a clear signal that the massive rigging of the referendum would be repeated in the forthcoming elections as well.
This was stated by Senator Mian Raza Rabbani, acting secretary general of the Pakistan People‘s Party in a statement here on Saturday.
Mr Rabbani said the polling arrangements as well as the campaign leading to the referendum was replete with massive corruption and malpractices unparalleled in our history.
He said even at the polling stations there was no sanctity of the ballot. There were no arrangements made for secret casting of votes, voter‘s lists, polling agents, transparent counting of votes or any restriction on multiple voting of pro-Musharraf voters, he said.
The PPP leader said these malpractices had been highlighted by the local and international media and this farce should not be repeated, if we wish to have any semblance of an electoral process in any future elections.
Commenting on Gen Musharraf’s announcements about accountability, Rabbani said that by now, people of Pakistan had seen enough of the one-sided political accountability, where purpose was only to block the democratic forces from bringing in constitutional democracy in the country.
He said the nation wanted to know the source and the expenditure of the billions of taxpayers money spent on promoting the hold of one man over the 140 million people of Pakistan.
Mr Rabbani said that it was high time that Gen Pervez Musharraf himself went through the accountability process and answered pertinent questions about the gross embezzlement misuse and misappropriation of public funds that were spent in the referendum campaign.
ARY CASE: A spokesman for the PPP has described ARY case against Benazir Bhutto as yet another referendum fraud with the people of Pakistan, our staff reporter adds.
The PPP spokesman was commenting on a press report, which stated that proceedings “have been initiated” against Ms Bhutto to declare her as an absconder in the reference.
He said the gold import licence was issued by the government after an open tender process. “The tender process for the award of license was transparent and above board, unlike the corrupt practices of the present regime where contracts are being awarded without tenders.”
The gold import licence process was undertaken by the ministry concerned and had nothing to do with the former prime minister or the PM’s secretariat, he said.
The party spokesman recalled that the ARY was an internationally recognised gold import company and not a fly-by-night unknown entity set up for corrupt practices.
He said the company had also denied paying any kickbacks. He said the members of the regime “have been regularly meeting” with the company owners, which contradicted their stance that they were involved in criminal activities. “The gold import policy was made to stop the menace of gold smuggling and was a notable achievement.”
The PPP spokesperson said that after the undemocratic overthrow of the popularly elected PPP government in 1996, democracy was killed and development came to a grinding halt.
He said Gen Musharraf “is openly courting the corrupt” in his bid to build a base on the backs of unpopular politicians.
