Daily Times

MUZAFFARABAD: Pakistan People’s Party turned down a suggestion of the National Command and Operation Center (NCOC) to postpone general elections in Azad Jammu Kashmir for two months.

Addressing a press conference accompanying by other party leaders, PPP-AJK President Chaudhary Latif Akbar said that his party would organize a protest rally on June 5 in Muzaffarabad against the letter written by NCOC to the Chief Election Commissioner.

NCOC had written a letter to the AJK Chief Election Commissioner two days earlier suggesting him to postpone the general election to be must held before the end of July, the ending tenure of present assembly as the public gatherings could intensify the spread of Covid-19 where the positivity rate is already more than nine percent.

The letter was circulated on social media but an Election Commission spokesperson said that they yet to receive the letter and will decide according with provisions of the law and interim constitution afterward. However, there is no provision in the AJK’s interim constitution to postpone the general election unless the Legislative Assembly passes some special law.

Under the constitution, the Election Commission is bound to announce the schedule of general elections before 45 minimum days of ending date of present assembly’s tenure which is July 31 this year. Latif Akbar said that the government at the centre was planning to manipulate the general elections in the Kashmiri state by establishing an interim set up in the region as it did in Gilgit Baltistan (GB).

He said that the central government managed the letter through NCOC for postponement of the election. He said that the letter was unlawful without any mandate and must be ignored as the constitution does not provide any power to the Election Commission for considering such a suggestion and the people of AJK will react strongly against such an extra constitutional act.

He said that the party will hold a protest rally on June 5 from Lal Chowk to the Central Press Club, making it clear on the authorities that the people will not accept usurping their right to choose genuine representative and consequences of such an act would be for reaching. He pointed out that NCOC didn’t postponed by elections in Punjab and Sindh despite high Covid positivity rate (more than eight percent).

How could the NCOC suggest in AJK which is legally out of its original jurisdiction of powers, he questioned, and termed it a conspiracy to rig the elections in the area. He said that the Pakistan Muslim League-N was part of that conspiracy as the party was frightened of losing election due to bad performance which was evident from the fact that the party couldn’t announce its candidates for the election.