ECP issues list of new delimitations ahead of general elections

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has issued preliminary list of new delimitations ahead of general polls, ARY News reported on Wednesday.

The chief election commissioner (CEC) and ECP members approved the preliminary list of new delimitations under the 2023 digital census data.

After CEC’s approval, the commission issued the initial list of the delimitations on its website.

Yesterday, the delimitation process of for the national and provincial assemblies entered its final phase and the ECP decided to approve initial delimitations.

For the National Assembly (NA), the voter quota for Punjab province was fixed at 905,595, 913,000 for Sindh, 907,913 for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP), 930,900 for Balochistan and 787,954 for Islamabad.

The voter quota for the Punjab Assembly will be 429,929, 428,431 for the Sindh Assembly, 355,270 for the KP Assembly and 292,047 for the Balochistan Assembly.

The election commission will address the objections from October 28 to November 26, whereas, the objections could be filed against the delimitations from September 27 to October 26.

The hearing on the pleas against the delimitations will be conducted till November 25. The ECP will unveil the final delimitations on November 30.

After the publication of the final delimitations, a 54-day election schedule will be announced and general polls will be held in the first week of January 2024.

On September 21, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) announced that general elections would be held in the last week of January 2024.

In a statement, the ECP said that it reviewed work on delimiting constituencies and decided that the initial list for the delimitation of constituencies would be published on September 27.

“The final delimitation list will be published on November 30,” said ECP, adding that general elections will be held in the last week of January 2024 following the 54-day election schedule.

The electoral body was under immense pressure from the political parties regarding the announcement of the election date.

The announcement comes a day after the ECP said it had scheduled a meeting with political parties next month to discuss the code of conduct for general elections.