ISLAMABAD, May 10: The civic authority will launch an operation to clean the federal capital by removing all banners, streamers, and party flags fixed in different parts of the city by the morning of May 12.

“We will ensure the removal of every party flag, banner, streamer and graffiti within 24hours to ensure the city’s clean image,” Capital Development Authority’s chairman, Syed Tahir Shahbaz, told Dawn on Friday.

Political parties have affixed banners across the main highways including the Islamabad Expressway, and Kashmir Highway.

“For removing the graffiti, the staff may take more than a day, but all graffiti and banners will be removed in the shortest possible time,” Mr Shahbaz maintained.

EMERGENCY ALERT: Mr Shahbaz added that all formations of the authority would remain on high alert on the polling day to cope with any untoward incident.

He has directed the Emergency and Disasters Management Directorate, which manages the fire and rescue ambulance service, to stay on alert to avert any incident.

Meanwhile, Chief Commissioner Islamabad Jawad Paul informed Dawn that all 41 polling stations declared as highly sensitive would have one Assistant Sub Inspector (ASI) of the Islamabad Police along with eight police officials deployed at the spot.

Islamabad has a total of 550 polling stations in both NA-48 (urban) and NA-49 (rural).

Thirty-eight of those in NA-49 had been placed in Category-A (highly sensitive) while only three polling stations in NA-48 were placed in the highly sensitive category.

In the Category-B polling stations (sensitive), Mr Jawad said one ASI and six police constables would remain on duty.

He added that the security in Islamabad had been put on high alert because of the threats issued by the Taliban.

“The Army and Rangers will be present in the city close to the sensitive polling stations and in the sensitive areas of the city,” Mr Jawad said.

He said reserve police, each comprised of 20 officials, would also be placed at six points of the city and would be on the disposal of the Islamabad Police.