10.2m women registered as voters since 2017
Zubair Qureshi
The Election Commission is fully committed to improving electoral participation of vulnerable communities including women, persons with disabilities, transgender persons and non-Muslim minorities through extraordinary measures to register as well as educate them as required by the Elections Act, 2017۔
Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja expressed these views at the orientation workshop for senior management of Election Commission and National Database and Registration Authority on Phase-IV of the campaign.
The campaign started in July 2021 and has achieved milestones with regard to engaging and registering vulnerable communities in electoral process.
The CEC further said the Election Commission would bolster its nationwide efforts to maximize registration of women voters as part of its ongoing Women’s NIC and Voter Registration Campaign that is aimed at bringing down the gender gap on electoral rolls before the General Elections 2023.
The campaign, which was launched in October 2017, has been able to register 10.2 million women during its earlier three phases, bringing down the burgeoning gender gap to 12.37 million in April 2021.
The Election Commission will make all out efforts to enable them to participate in electoral processes in accordance with the spirit of the Article 25 of the Constitution, which guarantees equality for all citizens.
Addressing the workshop, the NADRA Chairman Tariq Malik expressed his gratitude to the CEC for bringing together all relevant officials of Election Commission and NADRA which would ensure better planning, effective coordination and greater institutional ownership of this critically important issue of under-registration of women voters.
He said that the NADRA would undertake necessary measures to smoothen the process of CNIC registration for vulnerable communities, particularly women, which is a legal prerequisite for their registration as voters.
He also instructed the NADRA senior staff to provide the required assistance to Election Commission and other civil society organizations implementing the Campaign, which includes provision of Mobile registration Vans whenever requisitioned by the election Commission under the camp-
aign.
