ISLAMABAD: As the poll inquiry commission rejected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) claims that 2013 general elections were systematically rigged, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has said the report endorsed the government’s point of view on the issue, as well as the mandate of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N).
20. GEIC Report -11-
proceedings and 5 were requests to be called as witnesses one of
which request the Commission had allowed.
26. The remaining 47 applications concerned individual
Constituencies. Election Petitions had been filed in a number of
these applications and many others provided scant evidence.
Consistent with its ruling on 9-6-15 in the case of the political
party NDM whose case was restricted to one Constituency only the
Commission found that these individual cases did not fall within
the scope of the Commission's TOR's and as such closed these 47
applications.
27. The Commission was of the view that the applications
filed by the political parties despite being supplemented in some
cases by additional documents/material etc still remained
insufficiently focused in assisting it to decide its TOR's. As such in
order to bring a greater focus to the TOR's the Commission issued
a questionnaire to the parties which read as under:
Questionnaire
28. In order to assist the Commission of Inquiry as per its
Terms of Reference in S.3 of the Ordinance and to enable the
Commission to adhere to the time set out in S.7 of the Ordinance
each Political Party which has filed an application before the
Commission shall file a concise written response to the
questionnaire below:-
Questionnaire
1. (a) Do you allege that the General Election 2013
(GE 13) were not organized and conducted
impartially, honestly, fairly and justly in
accordance with law.
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(b) If so, specify why?
(c) Please indicate the material and witnesses which
you will rely on in order to support your
allegation.
2. (a) Do you allege that the GE 13 were manipulated
or influenced pursuant to a systematic effort by
design by anyone?
(b) If so, please provide the following details:-
A (i) Who made the plan/design?
(ii) The material and witnesses which you will
rely on in order to support your allegation.
B (i) What was the plan/design?
(ii) The material and witnesses which you will
rely on in order to support your allegation.
C (i) Who implemented the plan/design?
(ii) The material and witnesses which you will
rely on in order to support your allegation.
D (i) How was the plan/design implemented?
(ii) The material and witnesses which you will
rely on in order to support your allegation.
3. (a) Does "systematic effort' as mentioned in S.3 (b)
include just National Assembly (NA) seats or
Provisional Assembly (PA) seats as well?
(b) If NA only does it include all 4 provinces or just
confined to certain provinces.
29. The effect of the replies to the Questionnaire, though in
many cases not particularly specific, enabled the Commission to
some extent to narrow down the issues and start from a focal
point, namely what precisely was being alleged by who against who
and on what material these allegations were based.
Modalities
30. With the additional documents and witness lists filed
by the political parties on 29-4-15 the Commission met with the
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lead counsels of the respective political parties who had filed
applications to settle modalities. It was agreed by all the parties
that parties could examine their own witnesses on oath to bring on
record relevant documents on which they may place reliance. That
although the parties may proposed witnesses the final decision of
which of the witnesses would be called would be made by the
Commission and these would be witnesses of the Commission who
may be examined by all the parties. It was stressed by the
Commission that in order to assist the Commission in deciding
which witnesses to call each party must set out fully the reasons
why it was necessary to call them in support of its position. It was
decided that formal proceedings of hearing witnesses would
commence in open court on 5 May 2015. The witnesses would
have a chance to exhibit relevant documents during their
testimony. After the recording of evidence each party would be
entitled, if it so desired to submit a written brief, arguments,
synopsis of its case, its reply to the questionnaire and each TOR
based on the evidence adduced. Thereafter each party, if it so
desired, would have the opportunity to address oral arguments.
r-A7?
72. GEIC Report -63-
on the thumb impression and old age. NADRA does not have finger
print experts. AFIS does not enlarge the thumb impression and he
was unaware that finger print experts enlarged the thumb
impression.
215. AFIS system was introduced in around 2005 and it
could only read electronic prints not the earlier paper ones. NADRA
had nothing to do with the procurement of ink or ink pads for the
elections and he did not know where the samples provided by the
ECP came from. He was aware that recently when updating their
SIMS approx 861,000 people had to get new electronic thumb
prints with NADRA because their old NIC's were based on paper
prints which were not readable.
PTI CW 9 Muddassir Rizvi (Head of Programs TDEA-FAFEN
during the elections)
216. He is head of Programs at FAFEN and was formerly its
CEO for 7 years. He supervised the observation of free and fair
elections in 2008. FAFEN is a program of TDEA (Trust for
Democratic Education and Accountability) which is a registered
trust and manages FAFEN.FAFEN is an NGO which consists of 42
other NGO's which are spread throughout Pakistan.
217. One of the objectives of FAFEN is to improve the
quality of elections through non partisan election observation and
educating the public on election matters. FAFEN does not receive
any Government funding.
218. He confirmed that FAFEN's Report in respect of the
2013 elections had been submitted before the Commission
consisting of 29 volumes and 6,000 pages and that he was aware
of the contents of the documents as he had read summary of the
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73. GEIC Report -64-
same. He also confirmed that he was involved in the compiling of
the Report.
219. FAFEN monitored 3 phases of the election (a) pre
election (b) election day and (c) post election. On election day
1 FAFEN used approx 38,000 trained observers who were accredited
by the ECP. Most of these observers remained posted at one
particular Polling station. They were alloWed access to the polling
station to witness the voting and counting. The other observers
acted as roving observers who would go from polling station to
1
polling station for observation purposes.
220. FAFEN prepared Reports throughout the election
process and in Oct 2014 based on its observing the electoral
process in 2013 gave recommendations to the ECP on electoral
reforms.
221. Shortly after the elections FAFEN wrote to the ECP
requesting certain forms (XIV, XV, XVI and XVII). The ECP issued a
direction to all RO's to provide the relevant election forms to those
who applied for them. Based on this notification FAFEN contacted
the RO's of 267 NA Constituencies and was able to obtain forms in
I
. respect of 161 NA seats. The other RO's did not reply.
222. FAFEN requested the ECP to provide the balance of
the forms and when these were not provided by the ECP FAFEN
approached the Ombudsman in October 2014 under the Freedom
of Information Act who on 15-4-15 ordered the ECP to provide the
forms to FAFEN. However the forms till date have still not been
provided. The forms mentioned in the FAFEN documents filed with
the commission were with FAFEN which could produce them if
required.
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223. He was not threatened by any Government agency but
the current Speaker of the NA called him to complain about a
report in connection with his Constituency. With regard to
Balochistan only a draft polling scheme remained on the ECP
website up to the election day.
224. He was aware that about 10 criminal cases had been
registered against him in Lahore and about 2 in Rahim Yar Khan
by passers by and that all the allegations were the same. These
cases were registered from 16 May onwards. On cross by PML (N)
he confirmed that the caretaker Governments were in place when
these FIR's were registered.
225. He confirmed that TDEA's funding came from USA, UK
and EU and that FAFEN was not a registered body in Pakistan.
With regard to TDEA it had not as yet paid tax for 2014 as it had
requested for an extension.
226. He explained the• Parallel Vote Tabulation System (PVT)
which is referred to in some of FAFEN's Reports which was
essentially a sampling of polling stations which are randomly
selected in all Constituencies and on that basis it is seen whether
the consolidation done by the RO is in line with the way the results
are counted at the Polling station.
227. On basis of PVT system the result tallied with that of
218 Constituencies announced by the ECP for winner and 1st and
2nd runner up whilst out of the remaining 46 Constituencies 18 of
these tallied with the ECP result for the winner and Pt Runner up.
However in 118 Constituencies because it was very close margin of
victory the winner and loser may change. With regard to the