Daily Times

LAHORE: On the hue and cry of the opposition parties with regard to alleged pre-poll rigging for the ruling party’s candidate Kulsoom Nawaz, District Returning Officer (DRO) Tahir Hassan has imposed a ban on the use of public resources and Punjab Chief Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s photos on electioneering ads during the by-elections in the constituency NA-120.

The DRO of NA-120 had meetings with Lord Mayor Mubashar Javed and Deputy Director of Pakistan Horticulture Authority (PHA) Muhammad Shahid Khan on Thursday and issued advices of not allowing any candidate to use public resources on his or her by-election campaign in the constituency.

He (DRO) also advised the lord mayor and deputy director of the PHA that public office holders should also avoid participating in the election campaign of any candidate in the by-election, and no development scheme should be launched in the area, as it was a violation of the code of conduct issued by the Election Commission of Pakistan in this regard.

Tahir Hassan, discussing the issue of campaigns being run by the ruling party’s members of National Assembly (MNAs) and members of the provincial assemblies (MPAs) for disqualified premier Nawaz Sharif’s wife, also directed that photos of any government authority should also not be used for election campaign advertisements (hoardings, posters, flexes, banners, leaflets, pamphlets, stickers, handbills, or other materials) by any candidate as per the code of conduct.

To this, Lahore Lord Mayor Mubashar Javed assured the DRO that he would issue directives to the deputy mayor and other local government representatives concerned to implement on the said code of conduct with immediate effect.

The DRO also directed PHA Deputy Director Shahid Khan to immediately remove all the election campaign material that had been installed on the roads and in streets of the constituency that were violating the code of conduct, as there were photos of some government authorities (Punjab chief minister and other ministers).

He advised the PHA deputy director to take immediate action and remove all such banners, flaxes, hoardings, posters and other campaign items fixed on the roads, especially in prominent areas like Chauburji, Sessions Court, Civil Secretariat, Kareem Park, Mozang, Lakshmi Chowk, Sanda Road, Krishan Nagar, Rajgard, and Sanda.

The PHA deputy director assured the DRO that all such illegal material would be removed from the constituency immediately.

It is also pertinent to mention here that the ECP on the request of opposition parties, especially the PTI and the PPP, also wrote a letter to the Ministry of Defence to deploy army troops inside and outside the polling stations during the by-election in NA-120 to avoid any untoward incident.

Published in Daily Times, August 25^th 2017.