The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has announced that ECP to hold local government elections in Punjab under the 2022 law, ending years of delay in the country’s largest province. The electoral authority ruled that the long-overdue local body polls will finally take place in the last week of December 2025, with the delimitation process beginning immediately and expected to be completed within two months.
Headed by Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Sikandar Sultan Raja, the ECP bench stated that the elections will be conducted strictly according to the 2022 legislation, ensuring transparency and constitutional compliance. Other members of the bench include Nisar Durrani, Shah Muhammad Jatoi, and Babar Hassan Bharwana.
During the hearing, CEC Sikandar Sultan Raja expressed strong displeasure over the persistent delay in holding the local government elections, terming it an “embarrassment” for both the ECP and the successive governments of Punjab. He remarked that despite repeated directives, “all the governments that came into power did not want these elections to be held,” suggesting deliberate political maneuvering to avoid empowering local representatives.
The ECP further clarified that the term of Punjab’s last local governments had expired in December 2021, yet no elections were held since then. The commission highlighted that the Punjab government amended the local government laws five times within a few years, introducing two separate LG laws in May 2019, followed by amendments in December 2021, June 2022, and November 2022.
The judgment noted that the ECP had already begun the delimitation process in June 2020, which was suspended multiple times upon the provincial government’s request. The commission resumed delimitation in December 2021 and again between 2022 and February 2023, only to have the process withdrawn once more in June 2024 due to Punjab’s delays.
Reiterating that the ECP to hold local government elections in Punjab under the 2022 law without further political interference, CEC Raja emphasized that the time had come for the election body to exercise its constitutional authority decisively. He rejected Punjab government claims that the ECP was delaying the process, saying, “They themselves are delaying and blaming the ECP.”
This landmark decision is expected to restore democratic representation at the grassroots level after almost four years and marks a critical step toward strengthening governance, accountability, and public service delivery in Punjab.