President Dr Arif Alvi signed an ordinance amending the Election Act 2017 to provide for holding the Senate election through open ballot. Through Election (Amendment) Ordinance 2021, the president amended sub-section VI of section 122 of the Election Act 2017. The ordinance, released by the President House, will come into force if the Supreme Court, hearing Reference No 1 of 2021, opined that the matter was not in its purview. In such a case, the Senate election scheduled in March this year would be held through open ballot. The ordinance calls for “open and identifiable ballot” and further stated that the Election Commission would show the ballot to the political party of it requested for the same after the election. One thinks that, what does it mean for? and why Election Commission is being made answerable to political party or parties? Because this ordinance has been framed by PTI government, therefore, it will be a desire of PTI to know, who voted for whom? This sentence clearly depicts the intent behind the ordinance. It is more than an intimidation for parliamentarians particularly sitting members of PTI and its allies to restrict them from voting other than party candidate in coming Senate election. If one looks at the sequence of events during last 2-3 weeks, first government filed presidential reference on Senate open ballot poll in Supreme Court of Pakistan. Supreme Court sorted the standing of all provinces, political parties, and Election Commission of Pakistan. Except Sindh all others went for open ballot, while opposition parties including Jamat-e-Islami opposed the open ballot. Jamat-e-Islami urged that the constitution doesn’t empower the court to decide a political question. Whereas Election Commission of Pakistan articulated that there is no room for open ballot voting in the upcoming Senate elections. During all this process, Government tabled a constitutional amendment on the house floor in a hast, the opposition parties rejected the proposed amendment and the house changed into a fish market on that day. After two-day deliberations, PTI government framed an ordinance on open ballot Senate Poll conditioning it to the decision of Supreme Court. The people of the country witnessed another surprising event during last weeks, when government issued development grants to parliamentarians ahead of Senate Election. An action severely opposed by the Prime Minister Imran Khan during his days of political activism date back to 2014-2015. The honorable Supreme Court took notice of this grant distributions while commenting contrary to the rules of business.
Why there is too much hast and panic in government’s ranks on this issue. It is not an administrative issue being dealt by ordinance by the incumbent government. It is constitutional issue and should be deliberated on the house floor before passing it into law. Government has a nominal majority in the house and if some of its members vote for opposition candidates during Senate election, its position will become more vulnerable to any future no-confidence move by the opposition. So, all this is a fear and anxiety before something to happen.
