General elections may be delayed for want of new delimitation of constituencies: ECP

After the results were notified, delimitations would begin which would not be complete by October

ISLAMABAD (Web Desk) – The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has once again excused itself from holding general elections presumably in October as new constituency delimitations have not yet been done.

According to an official of the ECP, the results of digital census held earlier this year have not yet been officially notified.

After the results were notified, the task of delimitations would begin which would not be complete by or before October, he was quoted as saying.

In this scenario, the general elections 2023 in the country would have to be conducted as per the limits of the constituencies published by the ECP on August 5 last year, he added.

It may be noted that a post-enumeration survey is scheduled to start on July 8 and the final report will be submitted to the Council of Common Interests (CCI) by July 31.

He said that under Article 51(5) of the Constitution and Section 17 (2) of the Elections Act, the final published data was required for the purpose of delimitation of constituencies, and the ECP was bound to start the delimitation process once the census report was officially published.

Seats in the National Assembly are allocated to each province and federal territory based on the population according to the last preceding officially published census, under Article-51(3) of the Constitution.

Therefore, a constitutional amendment would be required following the official publication of census results, which was technically not possible after acceptance of resignations of the PTI lawmakers, he continued.

The official claimed that a fresh delimitation exercise usually takes around four to six months which would make it impossible to hold elections in October this year.

He said the belated exercise of fresh census with general elections just around the corner makes it practically impossible for the ECP to carry out fresh delimitation for the upcoming general elections.

If the government insisted on holding election in time, the ECP has no other option but to do the exercise on the basis of the existing delimitation, he maintained.

The other problem to hold elections in October is preparation of new electoral rolls on the basis of new census report.

The revision of electoral rolls would have to be carried out to adjust any increase or decrease in the number of census block codes and changes in the boundaries of blocks in different districts, he stated.

Another ECP official said the last census was held between March and May, 2017. Following the 24th Constitutional Amendment in Article 51 in Dec 2017, the delimitation of constituencies for the 2018 general elections was carried out on the basis of provisional results of the 2017 census as a one-time dispensation.

The final results of the population census were published in the official gazette by the Pakistan Bureau of Statistics on May 6, 2021.

Under the Constitution, it is imperative for the ECP to carry out delimitation of all the constituencies of the national and provincial assemblies before the next general elections. Accordingly, provincial governments and Pakistan Bureau of Statistics were asked to supply requisite maps and data. The procured data and maps were scrutinised at ECP Secretariat.

He said the commission successfully completed the delimitation process after adopting all legal measures enshrined in the Elections Act and the Rules, 2017, and published final delimitation of constituencies on Aug 5, 2022.