IN the late hours of Saturday evening on the 13th of January Supreme Court of Pakistan under a three-member bench led by CJ Qazi Faez Isa decided that the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf did not hold proper intra-party elections and, was therefore no longer eligible to take part in the general election scheduled for February 8th. This means that the party can no longer go to polls with its iconic bat symbol – a controversial ruling that will perhaps be long remembered for the stripping or reinstating of all democratic normalcy… depending on your subjective idea of democracy.
For now, as we stand a mere two weeks to election day, there seems to be a complete lack of fair treatment being extended to political parties across the board. Saturday’s decision has further dented the belief in a free and fair transition of power. The decision has also come as a disappointment to many young minds like me, who hoped that things would be slightly different under the new, upright and earnest CJ.
However, the decision to strip PTI of its common symbol has far-reaching implications for those who held tickets from the party. In each constituency, the voters will now have to remember the correct symbols for the PTI National Assembly candidate and the Provincial Assembly candidate respectively – both will have different symbols and naturally different names. While this may not seem like a big deal to those sitting in urban center drawing rooms, those with limited ability to read and write i.e. the ones that cast their vote merely through the use of a common symbol as their guiding light will make mistakes. Hence the number of falsely cast and rejected votes will increase. Once, these independent candidates make it to parliament, that is if they do, their voting will not be controlled by any party leadership. Who they choose as a candidate for chief minister and prime minister and from which party will be chaotic, to put it nicely. Beyond that, as a direct result of the ruling, the party has also lost its quota of indirectly elected seats after the election.
By writing this piece, I, in no way, intend to deny the flaws in the way the PTI conducted the mandatory exercise of intra-party elections as required by ECP rules. However, I too, can not deny the fact that elections within other political parties are anywhere close to what is democratic, and hence the selective treatment of Imran Khan’s Tehreek-i-Insaaf is problematic.
More importantly, by reiterating the controversial decision of the Election Commission, the Supreme Court has exposed itself to criticism of not being non-partisan. At this point, when times are troubled and the political landscape questionable, nothing could have been worse than the judiciary being accused of following a certain narrative.
Ultimately, this particular decision will be remembered for long. Whether it strengthens the overall democracy or weakens it, time will tell. Whatever political party takes the polls next month, a skeptic lens will be cast over how they got there and what they eventually do.
—The writer is Assistant Editor, daily Pakistan Observer, Islamabad.
Email: [email protected]
views expressed are writer’s own.
