ISLAMABAD: Less than two months after expressing its willingness to hold local government elections in Punjab on the dates falling between the coming 15 December and 15 January, the provincial government has declined to hold these elections in Pakistan’s largest before April next year, it has emerged.
Rejecting this decision, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has decided to issue forthwith the schedule for Punjab LG elections.
In addition, the poll body has also decided to immediately issue LG polls schedule for all the 42 cantonments located across the country, stating that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and the Defence Ministry did not take the required steps regarding LG cantonment polls.
The decisions were taken on Thursday in an ECP meeting headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja and attended by the senior ECP management.
The meeting was informed that the Punjab government was unwilling to hold the LG elections on the dates falling between 15 December to 15 January due to “heavy fog” and “extremely cold weather conditions” that prevail during these days.
Keeping in view that the holy month of Ramzan would begin in February next year and end in the following month of March, the Punjab government wants the LG polls to be held phase-wise starting from April next year, the meeting was informed.
The ECP meeting rejected as “unsatisfactory” the provincial government’s stance, and decided to immediately issue the LG polls schedule, directing the relevant officials to ensure compliance with this decision.
In a meeting between the ECP and the Punjab government officials held on 20 August this year, the provincial side had conveyed to the electoral body that Punjab government was ready to hold phase-wise LG elections in the province on the dates between the coming 15 December and 15 January due to the availability of government teachers to be assigned election duties, following annual winter vacations in the government schools in the province during that period. The ECP had agreed to this proposal before the provincial government backtracked.
Section 219(3) of the Elections Act 2017 provides that the ECP shall, in consultation with the federal or the provincial government concerned, make an announcement of the date or dates on which the elections to a local government shall be conducted in a province, a cantonment or the Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT).
The LGs’ five-year term in Punjab expired on 31 December 2021.
On this month’s fifth, it was revealed in an ECP meeting that CEC Raja had written a letter to PM Sharif, and the ECP had sent multiple reminders to the federal government, regarding the conduct of LG elections in the cantonments, but there was no headway in this regard.
The same meeting had decided that “one final letter” would be written to the Defence Ministry regarding cantonment LG polls.
The ECP’s Thursday meeting was informed that there was no satisfactory progress from the government’s side. The electoral body then decided to issue the LG polls schedule for the cantonments forthwith.
The Section 19-D(2) of the Cantonments (Amendment) Act, 2023 reads that the ECP shall, on receipt of a request in writing from the federal government, issue a programme for the conduct of LG elections in the cantonments and shall fix the dates for filing of nomination papers, scrutiny, allotment of symbols and other relevant steps.
The LG elections in the 42 cantonments were held on 12 December 2021. Legally, the four-year term of the elected representatives of any cantonment begins with their oath-taking.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2026