Post date: May 11, 2013 5:54:37 PM
Voters in isolated polling stations were angered by apparent election irregularities with one polling station closing early after running out of ballots and another never opening at all and the Election Commission admits the process was flawed.
ISLAMABAD, PAKISTAN ( MAY 11, 2013) (REUTERS) - As polling came to a close in Pakistan's historic election on Saturday (May 11), the country's Election Commission issued a statement admitting they had failed to hold free and fair elections in the commercial capital and biggest city Karachi. It said polling would be re-run in 40 locations.
"We have been unable to carry out free and fair elections in Karachi" read the statement.It is unclear whether the commission's conclusion means national elections will have to be held again.
Problems were not limited to Karachi, however.
In the garrison city of Rawalpindi, police emptied out a women's voting station 25 minutes before polls closed.
And in a polling station in capital Islamabad, women polling agents of various parties bickered with polling staff over a ballot box that seemed to have been tampered with.
"We will not accept the result of this polling station. We reject it," said a burqa-clad polling agent belonging to Jamaat-e-Islami, as men wrangled with one another under the watchful eyes of two EU election observers.
Meanwhile, breathless 24/7 news channels began reporting the partial count while many were still queuing in places where voting had started hours behind schedule.
As one channel announced partial results, another showed a group of men at a counting centre emptying containers of ballot papers that fell in a muddle across a table.
Soon afterwards, election commission secretary Ishtiaq Ahmed Khan told a news conference in Islamabad, the Commission members were shocked to see results trickling out on television channels even before the voting deadline had expired.
"The result should come out after the time for polling fixed by the Election Commission expires. Here our time was not over - we had extended it - and if results start coming in what is the legal status of that? We will be making inquiries about all this," Khan said.