Govt, opposition suggest three ECP officials names for each province

The names will be submitted at speaker office of ECP tomorrow, while, a parliamentary committee meeting will be held in this regard at 10:00am on Monday.

According to details, all the election commission members were retired on June 13, 2016, after which ECP has become inactive. Constitutionally, the members should be appointed within 45 days, however it has been 39 days and the members could not be appointed so far. Now, the government and the opposition have finalized three names which will be submitted in speaker office tomorrow.

Earlier, Leader of Opposition Khursheed Shah met with Finance Minister Ishaq Dar to discuss the nomination of officials on vacant seats in the ECP.

The meeting comes at a crucial time as the Supreme Court has intervened and ordered the government to appoint the officials in the ECP by 27th July. The apex court had taken a suo moto notice and issued the directive, after the five-year tenure of the four members of the ECP has ended.

The two discussed a range of issues and reaffirmed to solve the issue before the deadline set by the court. They have previously met on 12th and 17th July over the issue and agreed that the officials would be selected on merit to enable transparent and free and fair elections in the country.

Sources said that Ishaq Dar would meet Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and brief him over the talks on the issue. He is also expected to meet Khursheed Shah again tomorrow.

To a query, regarding names of the officials suggested, Dar said the names are in sealed letters which would be made public on July 24.