Under the law, all political parties are required to give at least five per cent tickets to women on the general seats of national and provincial assemblies. Well, guess what, the country's three biggest parties, the PML-N, the PTI and the PPP, have barely followed this official requirement.
According to the list of NA candidates announced by these parties so far:
- PPP has fielded a total of 176 candidates, of which 12 (6.8pc) are women
- PTI has given tickets to 244 candidates, 14 of them are women (5.7pc),
- PML-N has so far announced 125 candidates, of which five (4pc) are women
The patterns for provincial candidates aren't so different and in some cases there isn't even an attempt at following the law.
Thankfully though, a member of the previous Election Reforms Committee, which had approved the law, has stated that the Election Commission could take action against parties that are't following the law in this case.
The commission can even prevent all candidates of such a party, from the provinces where they violated the law, from using their allotted election symbol. There have been reports that the ECP has already sought details from political parties in this regard.
We are glad that measures have been taken and actions are being planned against parties that actively keep women out of the political process and want to keep them relegated forever to the "reserved seats" backbench.
Read the full piece on the inclusion of female candidates here.
