Daily Times

Pakistan People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPPP) candidate for Sanghar’s PS-41 constituency Mashooque Chandio accused his opponent of rigging the elections and demanded the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to recount the votes in his constituency and conduct re-polling on a total of six polling stations in the district.

PS-41 is one of the six Sindh Assembly constituencies in Sanghar. The constituency is symbolically important as Sanghar has been the bastion of Pakistan Muslim League-Functional (PML-F) which took part in July 25 elections under the umbrella of anti-PPP Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA). In the past, opponents repeatedly accused PML-F of rigging the elections and neglecting Sanghar district for many decades.

According to unofficial poll results, Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) candidate Ali Ghulam Nizamani remained on top securing 36,024 votes while PPPP’s Mashooque Chandio secured 35,922 votes. Speaking at a press conference held on Thursday, Chandio claimed that after the polling officially came to an end Ali Ghulam Nizamani along with his supporters entered polling station number 25 at 10:30 pm.” Our agents were kicked out from the polling station,” he told the media.

According to Chandio, he informed the relevant officials that Nizamani was casting bogus votes during his stay at the polling station but no action was taken against the candidate.

PPPP candidate said that there were fifteen polling stations where form-45 was granted to his polling agents. “On these polling stations, presiding officers were the followers of Pir Sahab Pagara,” he alleged, adding that he was winning comfortably till Wednesday night but on Thursday morning he got to know that he had lost the election with a margin of 102 votes. Chandio said that in the past PPP’s opponents used to win by a heavy margin because there was hardly any deployment of polling agents from his party but this time, PPP assigned polling agents to prevent rigging. Chandio also said that three members of his polling support team sustained injuries after GDA supporters attacked them. “I complained to the Returning Officer (RO) and Deputy Returning Officer (DRO) right away but no action was taken by them,” said Chandio.

Chandio then demanded re-polling on six stations in Union Council (UC) Kalar, as according to him, opponents won only because of bogus voting. “The rigging was evident as turnout on those polling stations touched ninety percent which is unusual,” said the candidate.

“I appeal to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and Supreme Court (SC) to take the notice of the situation. I want justice,” stated the candidate.

There are three National Assembly and six Sindh Assembly seats in the Sanghar district. According to unofficial polling results, PPPP managed win on all National Assembly seats. PPP won three of the six provincial assembly teams while the remaining seats were taken by Pir Pagara-led GDA.

According to unofficial results, PPPP’s Naved Dero won from NA-215 by securing 77,812 votes while GDA’s Haji Khuda Bux Rajar followed close behind with 77,227 votes. In NA-216, PPPP’s Shazia Marri took the lead by securing a total of 82230 votes while GDA’s Kishan Chand Parwani secured 69820 votes. PPPP’s Roshan Junejo won from NA-217 by securing 102,361 votes while GDA’s Mehar Ali alias Mahi Khan Wassan secured

Out of the districts six provincial assembly seats, GDA’s Qazi Shamsuddin Rajar won on PS-42 by securing 44,370 votes while PPPP’s Ali Hasan Hingorjo secured 35,051 votes. PPPP candidate Jam Madad Ali took the lead in PS-43 by securing 44,737 votes against GDA’s Jam Zulfiqar who secured 28,488 votes. In PS-44, PPPP’s Faraz Dero won by securing 28,488 votes against GDA’s Niaz Hussain who secured 13,704 votes in total.

PPPP’s Shahid Thaheem won from PS-45 by securing 45,620 votes while GDA’s Muhammad Baksh secured 31, 192 votes. In PS-46 GDA’s Waryam Faqeer took the lead by securing 42,393 votes while PPPP’s Rana Abdul Sattar followed close behind with 41,466 votes.

Published in Daily Times, July 27^th 2018.