The Lahore High Court (LHC) was informed by Punjab Governor Balighur Rehman on Thursday that he was not required to set a date for the elections because the provincial assembly had not been dissolved.
The governor made this statement in response to a petition that citizen Munir Ahmed had filed against him for failing to announce the election date following the dissolution of the parliament.
“It is categorically rejected that the replying respondent No. 1 was in any way required to set the date of elections when he has never dissolved the Assembly while acting on the so-called suggestion of the Chief Minister,” the governor stated in his eight-page response to the LHC.
He also denied claims that his action is preventing ECP from carrying out its responsibilities, labelling the claims as “fallacious.”
“The contents of the present paragraph are denied to be untrue, annoying, and wholly without foundation. The governor pleaded with the court to dismiss the case, saying, “It is sad that malafides have been attributed to the replying respondent in utter violation of the principles of the Constitution.
In the meantime, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) submitted a similar petition asking for the province’s elections to be announced, and LHC Justice Jawad Hassan heard it.
When PTI leaders, including Asad Umar, Fawad Chaudhry, PML-N leader Rana Mashood, and others, attended the hearing.
The 90-day window set aside by the Constitution for holding the elections would be affected by additional delay, Mr. Chaudhry argued with the court to rule on the petition tomorrow (Friday).
The electoral board was facing a number of obstacles, including financial ones, to holding the polls, the ECP lawyer testified in court.
However, the attorney for the federal government asked the judge to set up a bigger bench to hear the case.
The administration and ECP, according to the PTI lawyer, were not serious about holding elections on schedule. Asad Umar forewarned that if an election date was not declared within three days, a constitutional crisis would develop.
Justice Jawad Hassan instructed the ECP and the Punjab governor to submit their thorough responses in the case on Friday after hearing the arguments.
