Muttahida Qaumi Movement-P rejects elections on 2017 census

ECP registers 120.6mn voters across country,

KARACHI/Islamabad_ The Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) Convener Dr Khalid Maqbool Siddiqui on Monday rejected the coalition government’s decision of holding elections on the the old census.

Addressing a press conference, Siddiqui said the population of Karachi was around 30 million, which was counted about 14.9 million in the 2017 census. He said that his party would not accept the census figures.

The MQM-P leader announced opposing the move after Interior Minister Rana Sanaullah announced that the government would not notify the recently concluded census as the results were not authentic and the Election Commission of Pakistan (CCP) was required at least four months to complete the delimitation process.

“The census is conducted after every 10 years, but the last one becomes controversial, and it was decided to conduct a fresh exercise to address reservations and carry out a fresh delimitation process,” said Siddiqui.

Siddiqui said the government would complete its term in August. “We have made all efforts for the peace in the city. Fresh census is one of our main demands.”

The Election Commission of Pakistan on Monday released the details of voters from across the country.

As per the details published by the ECP, the total number of registered voters reached 120.6 million – male voters are 60.8 million and female voters are 50.7 million.

In terms of age, 20.35 million were in the age bracket of 18 to 25 years while those in age limit of 26 to 35 years were 30.26 million and people in the age limit from 36 to 45 years were 20.77 million.

As for the provinces, most voters belonged to Punjab with almost 70.16 million people qualified to vote followed by Sindh with 20.65 million, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa with 20.16 million and Balochistan with 5.7 million voters.