Security agencies on Thursday have presaged that terrorists can make more attacks to sabotage the electoral process and political leaders of all parties were on their hit list.
In view of the new terrorism wave and the up-coming general election, Senate Committee on Interior convened a meeting, in which it was revealed that 65 political personalities - including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan and former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi – can be a target of terrorism.
The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) Secretary Babar Yaqoob Fateh Muhammad and officials of other institutions responded to the queries of the Senate body members.
Meanwhile, briefing the Senate Committee on Interior, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Director General Major General Asif Ghafoor said that the armed forces have no direct role in the elections, adding that they were just to maintain law and order.
Separately, the ECP secretary said that commission’s staff, in many constituencies, was being threatened, adding that the protection of polling stations and staff is a major challenge. The ECP Secretary said that, for the first time, watermarked ballot papers - imported from Europe - will be used in the elections.
He informed the committee that returning officers will send the results to the ECP through special software. Babar Yaqoob said that 450,000 police and 300,000 army troops will be deployed on the polling day. As many as 750,000 polling staff will perform duty.
Meanwhile, briefing the Senate body, NACTA National Coordinator Suleman said that 65 security alerts had been received so far and they were issued to all political parties.
He said that there were threats from banned organizations. Furthermore, Police officials added that Mastung incident attacker, Hafiz Nawaz, was from Abbottabad, however, his facilitators are being searched.
