Staff Report
KARACHI: In a dramatic turn of political events, the Sindh government announced that the long-awaited Local Government elections scheduled for January 15 in Karachi and Dadu would not be held.
According to the announcement — a late-night development — polls in seven districts – Tando Allahyar, Tando Muhammad Khan, Badin, Thatta, Sujawal and Jamshoro will go ahead as planned on January 15.
Addressing a press conference in the late hours of Thursday, Information Minister Sindh, Sharjeel Memon also announced that on the demand of their coalition partner; the MQM-P, the notification to hold the polls on the basis of the existing delimitation had also been withdrawn. He said the MQM-P had serious reservations about it.
Earlier, in the day, the MQM-P had expressed serious reservations and rejected the delimitation of Local Government constituencies. Addressing a press conference on the occasion of the reunification of the breakaway groups, the MQM-P leadership termed the delimitations as “unjustified”, and demanded withdrawal of notification issued in this regard.
At the hurriedly-called press conference, Memon said that the Sindh government had already written to the ECP for the postponement of the Local Government elections in Dadu since parts of the district were still under floodwaters. The decision came after the PPP leadership met in an an emergency meeting which was presided over by party chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and attended by CM Sindh Syed Murad Ali Shah, provincial ministers and the district presidents of the party’s Karachi chapter.
LG elections in Sindh
This is the third time that the second phase of the Local Government elections in Sindh has been postponed. The term of the LGs had expired on August 30, 2020, and the ECP was bound to hold elections within the 120 days.
