LAHORE, May 5: The government on Sunday dismissed with contempt repeated demands by parties in the ARD that an interim government of national consensus should be set up to ensure free and fair elections and that the Chief Election Commissioner should be replaced immediately in view of his alleged failure to check ‘large-scale’ rigging in the April 30 presidential referendum.

The president’s press secretary Maj-General Rashid Qureshi said while talking to Dawn that parties in the opposition alliance wanted to have their nominees — for which he used the word looters — in the government so that a situation like the one prevailed before 1999 could be restored.

The government would not let these parties revert the clock at any cost, said the general, who is also director-general of the Inter-Services Public Relations.

Attributing further motives to the ARD’s demands, Gen Qureshi said unfortunately the alliance leaders had developed a habit of finding faults with everything done by the government, no matter how noble and well-intentioned it might be. These people, he said, believed that the 30-month performance of the Musharraf- government was so excellent that opposition parties stood no future.

“The looters (of the past) are getting exposed at the hands of the present government and it is for this reason that illogical demands are being made”.

The president’s press secretary said that leaders and parties tried and tested in the past now felt sidelined as people were fully satisfied with the performance of the present government. These opponents were convinced that they would become redundant once the devolution plan took strong roots and enabled the people to get their problems solved at their doorsteps. It is for the fear of being thrown into oblivion, Gen Qureshi said, that ARD leaders were making unjust and unrealistic demands.

Gen Qureshi alleged that these parties and leaders wanted to uproot the system of local government and have same old centralized governance system restored which, according to him, brought them fabulous commissions and kickbacks.

He alleged that leaders whose personal bank accounts were bigger than the national budget and who had purchased expensive properties abroad wanted to have a system of their own choice. But, he made it clear that it would never happen.

The ISPR chief said he had received pictures of a huge building in a Gulf state purchased by a former prime minister of Pakistan for more than $200 million.

According to Gen Qureshi, the government had already issued instructions for an inquiry to find out the alleged irregularities committed in the presidential referendum. The purpose of the exercise was to establish credibility of the referendum at the international level.

Referring to allegations of multiple voting, he said they were exaggerated. If it be assumed that such accusations were true in the absence of proper checks, then, he argued, it was also possible that anti-Musharraf people were also involved in multiple voting.

He ridiculed the claim that a woman had cast 60 votes. Had it been so, he said, it could not be assumed that such a voter would go to the world media and the human rights organizations to inform them of the malpractice she had committed. “this is nothing but concoction”.

As for a journalist’s claim that his secretary had polled four votes, Gen Qureshi said it amounted to confessing an offence and the Election Commission should immediately arrest such a person. “The Election Commission, I believe, will take notice of such allegations and utterances”.

The president’s press secretary said he was informed that former prime ministers Benazir Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif had used money through their people to project the polling stations where the turnout was relatively low. He insisted that the turnout was not, and could not be, the same at all polling stations at all times.

The increase in the number of polling stations, which was decided to facilitate the voters, was the major reason that long queues were not seen at all places. If polling stations at some places were deserted, there were also countless such places where there were long queues and people had to wait for a long time to get an opportunity to cast their votes, he said.

Gen Qureshi said the government would learn a lesson from the referendum and ensure that problems faced on April 30 were not faced at the time of the general elections.

Replying to a question, the president’s press secretary hinted at the possibility of Gen Musharraf launching a new round of consultative process with politicians after the package of the constitutional amendments was made public and debated by all sections of society.