LAHORE:National Voters Day was celebrated with great enthusiasm in the Punjab province on Wednesday, December 7.
Various seminars, awareness walks and events were organised for creating awareness among voters in all districts of the province under the leadership of the district election commissioners. People from all walks of life actively participated in the events.
The main event in this regard was held in the provincial capital, which was organised by the Provincial Election Commissioner Punjab with Provincial Election Commissioner Saeed Gul in the chair. Joint Provincial Election Commissioners Abdul Hafeez and Sain Bakhsh Chanar, and other senior officers also participated in the event.
Personalities belonging to different schools of thought, civil society representatives, development partners of the Election Commission, leading personalities of institutions and media also participated in the ceremony.
Provincial Election Commissioner Saeed Gul, while addressing the participants, highlighted the importance of voting and said that it was the constitutional responsibility of the Election Commission to take all such steps to conduct a transparent election to strengthen the electoral system.
He said: “We were not only celebrating National Voters Day across the province with enthusiasm, but also appealing to all eligible people to ensure their registration as a voter and cast their votes on the election day.”
The provincial election commissioner also highlighted various initiatives of the Election Commission and said that the Commission was always making efforts to change the electoral system according to requirements of the new era. “The Election Commission has completed most of the goals of the five-year strategic plan 2019-23. The Election Commission has established a state-of-the-art Research and Development Centre, which is a research wing to work on EVMs [electronic voting machines] and various voting methods for overseas Pakistanis and the latest methods used worldwide,” he said.
He said that voter education and awareness work was also going on in all four provinces for creating awareness among voters. From January 2022, Student Voter Awareness Sessions were being organised at the provincial and district level, which the district election commissioners were continuing with enthusiasm in various educational institutions, he said.
The Election Commission recently completed the work of revising the electoral lists. This work was started on October 2021 and after passing through various stages, the final electoral list was released on October 7, 2022, according to which 70,634,735 voters were registered in Punjab.
He said that vote registration was still going on and 2,080 form collection centres had been established in Punjab province. Apart from this, one-window registration desks had also been set up in District Election Commissioner offices. The public is requested to send their identity card number to 8300 and check the vote details. He said that the Election Commission had reduced the difference between male and female voters in the voter list to an extent, he said
This difference was 12% in 2018, but today, due to the efforts of Election Commission, NADRA and civil society, the difference has reduced to 8%, he remarked.
The participants appreciated the steps taken by the Election Commission and assured their cooperation in creating awareness among voters. Minority representatives were also present at the event, and persons with disabilities also highlighted the difficulties faced by them in exercising their right to vote. Provincial Election Commissioner Punjab assured them that all problems would be resolved soon.