Last Updated on: 12th February 2024, 03:26 pm
Caretaker Prime Minister Anwaarul Haq Kakar has said that there was no pressure whatsoever on returning officers (ROs).
He criticized the news channels and blamed them for announcing unofficial and unconfirmed election results.
Caretaker PM’s Misleading Statements on Election Results
He justified the delayed election results by quoting the examples of Sweden and Indonesia. He stated that Sweden finalized the polling results in 10-12 days while Indonesia took nearly 30 days.
The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) took 36 hours to compile the results, according to the caretaker PM.
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For the record, the final election results were uploaded on the ECP’s portal on Sunday. Calculating the time from Thursday (5 PM) to Sunday (5 PM), we get 72 hours.
Whether the PM was caught lying in front of national and international media or was misinformed by his subordinates, is up to the public to decide.
Recalling the 2018 elections, the PM said it took 66 hours to finalize the results back then. However, he didn’t mention the collapse of ECP’s digital infrastructure during the last elections which resulted in the delay.
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Despite all the challenges in 2018, then Chief Election Commissioner (CEC), Sardar Raza Khan, announced the first official results at 4 AM after the elections. However, the current CEC was nowhere to be seen this time around.
The PM also said it isn’t the responsibility of the caretaker government to improve the electoral process.