A step towards elections: ECP issues preliminary delimitation lists

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) Wednesday published the lists of preliminary delimitation of constituencies, reported 24NewsHD TV channel.

Under the original delimitation schedule issued by the ECP on Aug 17 — ten days after the notification of census results — the initial delimitation exercise was to be completed on Oct 7 and preliminary proposals for delimitation along with the report were to be published on Oct 9.

However, on Sept 1, the ECP had announced squeezing timelines of the delimitation exercise by 14 days to complete the process on Nov 30, instead of the scheduled Dec 14.

The development would pave the way for the election commission to hold polls in the last week of January.

According to a statement issued by the ECP, the Preliminary Constituency Report along with Form 5 has been published for public information.

The report of preliminary constituencies is also available on the website of the Election Commission.

The publication of preliminary constituencies will continue from September 27 to October 26, the statement said.

The ECP said objections to the preliminary constituencies can be made by the voters of the respective constituencies.

It said the objections to the initial constituencies can be submitted to the Election Commission till October 27.

According to the ECP, only a voter of the concerned constituency can file objections.

The district maps can be obtained from the Election Commission on payment of the required fee.

The ECP said the objections by courier mail and fax will not be accepted.

Based on the initial delimitation, the population distribution in the National Assembly constituencies is as follows: Balochistan has 930,900 voters, followed by 913,052 voters in Sindh, 907,913 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, 905,595 in Punjab, and 787,954 in Islamabad.

The National Assembly consists of 266 general seats and 60 seats reserved for women. Ten seats have also been reserved for non-Muslims.

In the provincial assembly constituencies, the figures show Punjab leads with a total population of 429,929, followed by Sindh with 428,432, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 355,270, and Balochistan with 292,047.

As per the report of delimitation, a copy of which is available with Dawn.com, the share of seats in the national and provincial assemblies have been worked out on the basis of the final results of the 2023 census.

“The population of the province/area has been divided by the total number of general seats and the average population or quota per National Assembly seat was obtained. Similarly, the population of a province was divided by the total number of general seats allocated to the provincial assembly to obtain a quota per seat.

“In calculating the total number of seats, a fraction of 0.5 and above was generally taken as one seat and a fraction below 0.5 was ignored. Due to the peculiar situation in Balochistan, more than one district has been clubbed. Similarly, few clubbings have also been made in other provinces where necessary,” it said.