ECP asks provincial ECs, DROs to explain delay in poll results

KARACHI: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Wednesday asked provincial election commissioners and district returning officers to submit an explanation about the delay in poll results. 

In a written order, the electoral body inquired responsible officers why the poll results were delayed beyond 2AM. 

A day after the countrywide polls, on July 26, ECP Secretary Babar Yaqoob had said the results of General Election 2018 were delayed due to a technical glitch.

While speaking to media, he had said the delay had not been caused by any 'wicked conspiracy' or pressure, adding that the delay was a result of a malfunction in the result transmission system while data was entered into it.

"The RTS system had not been tested in Pakistan," he remarked.

Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, too, complained of delay in results of General Election 2018. He also said his party's candidates had complained that their polling agents had been thrown out of polling stations across the country.

ECP to hear plea on form 45 itself: Marriyum Aurangzeb

Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz leader Marriyum Aurangzeb said that the ECP will itself hear a petition related to form 45.

She made the statement after meeting Secretary ECP today. After the meeting, she said the authority’s two-member bench will hear the plea related to polling and recount.

She said that the formation of a bench for investigation is a satisfactory move. 

Pakistan voted for the country’s second consecutive democratic transfer of power on Wednesday, July 25, 2018.

Polling began at 8AM across the country's 85,307 polling stations and continued until 6PM despite calls by several major parties, including Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, Pakistan Peoples Party and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, to extend the polling time by an hour.

The parties had complained of “a slow voting process” and thus sought more time to facilitate voters — a request that was dismissed by ECP.

The election campaign was marred by violence with three candidates killed in targetted attacks and culminated with a suicide blast outside a polling station in Quetta which claimed at least 30 lives.