MULTAN, July 5: PPP central deputy secretary-general Shah Mahmood Qureshi has urged the Election Commission to order a ban on transfers and postings of administrative officials prior to the local polls. At a press conference here on Monday, he said all recent postings and transfers in government departments were politically motivated. He urged the EC to ban the use of Zakat funds prior to the local elections.

He said his party would field its candidates for the offices at all tiers of the local government from the platform of Awam Dost Group. He said there was a harmony among component parties of the Alliance for the Restoration of Democracy over the issue of local polls, and electoral adjustments could be struck with the MMA as well. He urged the district administrations to remain impartial in the electoral bout.

The PPP leader questioned the formation of a six-member committee for the local elections, and demanded that its aims and objectives be made public. He said the ministers and legislators should be barred from contesting elections without resigning from their present offices.

He said the government and the National Accountability Bureau should make public the list of corrupt nazims for the electorates’ guidance.

He urged the EC not to make the identity of a voter conditional only to the production of ID card. He also stressed the need for streamlining the electoral lists of the EC and the Nadra.

He objected to the delimitation of Multan district into six town committees terming it ‘a kind of pre-poll rigging’. He said the PPP was going to challenge the scheme.