Poll petitions’ disposal picks up, but still sluggish

ISLAMABAD: Election tribunals have picked momentum in deciding poll disputes, but still could only decide 27 per cent of petitions. With the legal deadline to decide poll petitions within 180 days having lapsed long ago, election tribunals decided 51 petitions between Nov 16, 2024 and Dec 31, 2024, bringing the total of decided petitions to 101 or 27 per cent of the total cases, according to systematic tracking of election disputes by Fafen, the Free and Fair Election Network.

Fafen has been able to track 370 out of 377 petitions filed with 23 tribunals. However, tribunals in Punjab, Sindh and KP continue to lag behind those in Balochistan where three tribunals have decided 41 out of 51 poll disputes (80pc).

Six KP, and five Sindh tribunals have decided only one-fifth of their respective caseloads with nine out of 42 KP cases and 16 out of 83 Sindh cases decided so far. Punjab tribunals have decided 35 out of 191 petitions so far that makes 18pc of their cumulative caseload.

Around one third of results disputes on provincial assembly constituencies and one fifth on National Assembly constituencies have been decided. Overall, 78 petitions on provincial constituencies have been decided — 34 for Balochistan Assembly, 25 for Punjab Assembly, 12 for Sindh Assembly, and seven for KP Assembly — as against 23 decisions of disputes on NA constituencies — 10 in Punjab, seven in Balochistan, four in Sindh and two in KP.

Tribunals have only decided 27pc of petitions so far

As multiple petitions can be filed against the result of a constituency, the number of NA constituenices decided is 21 and provincial assembly constituencies is 74. Most petitions decided so far was dismissed by the tribunals. As many as 97 out of 101 decided petitions have been dismissed, only three accepted whereas one petition has been abated due to death of the petitioner.

Some 43 were dismissed for non-maintainability, nine were dismissed as withdrawn by petitioners, 12 for non-prosecution, one for non-deposit of process fee despite a court order, and one for death of the returned candidate. The tribunals rejected 20 petitions after trial.

All petitions decided on NA constituencies have been dismissed whereas three petitions on Balochistan Assembly constituencies have been accepted with tribunals directing re-poll in parts of the constituencies.

These constituencies include PB-44, Quetta-VII; PB-45, Quetta-VIII; and PB-36, Kalat. Two accepted petitions were filed by losing candidates of JUI-P and one by the National Party against two winners from PPP Parliamentarian, and one from BAP.

Published in Dawn, January 3rd, 2025