Staff Reporter
Islamabad
Information Minister Shibli Faraz said on Saturday that allegations of pre-poll rigging hurled by opposition parties in the wake of the November 15 elections in Gilgit-Baltistan, had given an impression that they were finding an excuse for their “imminent defeat.”
Addressing a press conference in Islamabad, Shibli refuted the PPP and PML-N claims that attempts were being made by the PTI-led government to rig the Sunday polls.
Shibli assured the media that free and fair elections will held in G-B, insisting that his party’s government strongly believed in transparency.
Over a dozen political and religious parties – including the country’s three major parties PTI, PML-N and PPP – are contesting the polls, scheduled to be held today.
The people of G-B welcomed PTI because they wanted solutions to their problems, he said. “Previous governments have done nothing to solve problems in the last 10 years,” he added.
The minister also urged the media to cover the elections and remain vigilant amid the allegations of rigging. He said that his party had urged the PML-N while it was in government for electoral reforms to remove lacunas in the existing system. “There is a contradiction in the thinking of the PML-N leadership.”
