Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) senior leader and former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi has asserted that the government’s assertion to establish an electronic voting system is “akin to a wolf taking care of sheep”.
Addressing a press conference alongside party leaders Ahsan Iqbal and Marriyum Aurangzeb, the former premier said that the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led government’s plan to introduce electronic voting machines (EVMs) was another method to steal votes.
“If someone takes the machines away or makes the data disappear then where will we go?” he asked, further claiming that members of the ruling party were those “who themselves are involved in stealing elections and who themselves came into power after the most controversial elections held in Pakistan’s history”.
Speaking on the letter Prime Minister Imran Khan wrote to National Assembly (NA) Speaker Asad Qaiser, Abbasi said that the person who does not sit in the NA sessions had the audacity to write to its speaker.
He referred to the letter as “two ignorant men writing to each other”, and pointed out that even though a month has passed since the incident wherein 20 presideing officers (POs) were kidnapped during the NA-75 by-election, no action has been taken.
“And these members of the House are writing to one another saying the election system has been destroyed. The system has always been in place. You must catch the one who destroyed it.
“You must nab the one who kidnapped the presiding officer in Daska and the one who stole votes. You must catch those who put cameras in the Senate. You must catch those who appointed the presiding officer of the biggest institution’s election — the Senate polls,” said Abbasi.
He went on to say that the presiding officer “did not see instructions that the stamp on votes can be put anywhere inside the candidate’s box on the ballot paper and has made the senate polls controversial”.
“And now they are talking of electronic voting machines.”
Continuing to lambast the move, Abbasi asserted that Qaiser did not know the rules of the parliament, alleging that “If the speaker knew of parliamentary rules, [he would not have been a silent spectator] when the premier took the name of five opposition leaders and bad-mouthed them. They were defamed and accused but the speaker remained silent”.
“Even he did not have the courtesy to call out the incident as wrong,” he added.
The former premier alleged that the speaker also prevented the media from going to the parliament lodges where the opposition MNAs and senators live.
The former PM took more shots at Qaiser, claiming that the speaker did not fulfill the duties of his authority and his responsibility, adding that the NA speaker was a coward and shameless.
“If he has any respect for the rules and any courage. If he wishes to remain unabashed and without shame and continue his employment, then he can go on,” Abbasi said.
“The speaker is supposed to be non-partisan and one who earns the opposition’s respect.”
He added that the speaker “is one who neither lets the leader of the opposition speak and who does not see the empty front row of benches”.
“The leader of the opposition is in jail who has no case against him and so is the parliamentary party leader. But the speaker remains silent. The custodian of the House remains silent.
“This is the misfortune of the House. Who will trust such a speaker?” Abbasi asked.
He said that it was the Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) which had stopped asking for production orders of incarcerated leaders “although it is the speaker’s responsibility to ensure this on his own”.
Abbasi asserted that the PDM “has come to right these wrongs within the system”. He added that while the member parties of the alliance could not see eye to eye during yesterday’s meeting, “it stands united and its success comes from the fact that even talks behind close doors are there before the people today”.
