LAHORE, June 3: The Alliance for Restoration of Democracy on Monday issued a white paper which questions the validity of the April 30 referendum on constitutional, factual and political grounds.
The paper, released by the alliance’s deputy information secretary Munir Ahmad Khan, alleged that the turnout claimed by the Election Commission was highly exaggerated and at some places the votes polled had outnumbered the registered voters.
The instances of misuse of the public money have also been highlighted in the document.
This is the third white paper on the subject. The earlier two had been released by the PML(N) and the Jamaat-i-Islami.
All parties are of the view that Chief Election Commissioner Justice Irshad Hasan Khan had failed to hold an impartial and fair referendum and thus must be removed without delay to ensure free and fair general elections.
The ARD white papers says that no sane person will believe in the fiction presented as facts:
“No less amazing is the turnout in Lahore where 1.9 million electorates out of a population of 4.0 million came out to vote in the referendum, regardless of the gross under-reporting of true facts by many a biased and characterless hacks. It means that the people of Lahore had come out on the streets to vote in more than double the reception Imam Khomeini got in Tehran in 1979 or two-time greater than the mob that came to receive Ms Benazir Bhutto in 1986. Under the leadership of district Nazim Mian Amer Mahmood the Lahorites have broken, at least, two records.
“Similar is the story of Karachi where the MQM, the PPP, the PML(N) and the Jamaat boycotted the referendum, but the Naib Nazim set even much healthier record. Can any sane man believe in these figures?
“In Muzaffargarh district, when the people were forced to cast their votes, some people cast their votes and mentioned the name of Nawabzada Nasrullah Khan, Mian Nawaz Sharif, Pir Pagara, Makhdoom Amin Fahim, Nawab Akbar Bugti, Wali Khan, Qazi Husain Ahmad, Maulana Fazlur Rahman and other leaders. On the other hand, the women of this area cast their votes and mentioned the name of Ms Benazir Bhutto, Naheed Khan and other women.”
A chapter on “Drop Scene of referendum on April 30” says:
“There were 60 million ballot papers for 87,074 polling stations, 163,641 polling booths, and over 0.4 million staff who carried out referendum to facilitate voters above the age of 18 years.
“More than 3,000 unconventional polling stations were set up in parks, government offices, factories, railway stations, bus stands, petrol pumps, hotels and offices of political parties. Referendum day proved bleak for the government machinery, which tried its level best to bring the people out of their homes for casting ballots in favour of Gen Musharraf. On April 30, polling stations were giving deserted look and the polling staff was seen sitting outside polling stations or playing cards, due to lack of voters.
“The administration filled ballot boxes with stamped ballots on the eve of the referendum and sent them to different polling stations.
“Seeing terribly low turnout, Nazims and councillors forced people to cast their vote. But after failing in getting them to polling stations, they used another method. They visited different polling stations with several groups of 25 sweepers and gardeners and cast their votes at least for eight times.
“In the afternoon, police officials were directed to visit different polling stations and cast multiple votes and wherever polling officers resisted them, they thrashed them and forcibly cast votes.
“Police deployed at railway stations and bus stands forced commuters to cast their votes at every station and stop.
“Interestingly, district coordination officers and SPs were responsible for boosting the turnout. In this regard, they kept on getting directions from chief secretaries and inspectors general of their respective provinces.
“In various polling stations, small children and foreigners also cast vote and nobody stopped them.
“In different government departments, ballot papers were released before April 30 and the employees were forced to cast their votes with a threat of being fired from their jobs.
“Pakistan Television kept on broadcasting old films of elections because they could not capture even a single crowded polling station throughout the country.
“Administration kept on taking groups of people to the polling stations which were to be visited by Gen Musharraf, governors and the Chief Election Commissioner, in order to show them activity there.”