Low Female Participation in Karachi Press Club Election

The annual election of the Karachi Press Club (KPC) is underway on Saturday however only with a low female representation.

The vote casting will continue uninterrupted from 9 am to 5 pm. United and Democrats are competing for the 2021 elections.

Both competitors have announced the names of the candidates for 12- member panel.

However, it is the first time that a panel has nominated a female for the position of Vice-President in the Karachi Press Club election.

United Panel

The nominated candidates of the United panel include Habib Khan Ghauri for presidential and Saeed Jan Baloch for vice-president.

Other nominations from the United panel include Ataullah Abro for treasurer, Qasim Khan for secretary, and Ali Imran Jr for joint secretary.

Further, then nominations for the members of the governing body include Khalid Farshuri, Mohammad Athar Khan, Rafi Hussain Farooqi, Mohammad Atiq, Shakeel Yamin Kanga, and Zia Qureshi.

The only female candidate is Shaheen Fatima.

Democrats Panel

The presidential candidate from the Democrats Panel is Fazil Jamili from Jang Karachi while Shazia Hassan from Dawn is competing for the vice-president.

Abdul Waheed Rajpar from 92 News has been nominated for treasurer, Mohammad Rizwan Bhatti from Daily Business Recorder for Secretary, and Mohammad Saqib Saghir from Jang Karachi has been nominated for Joint Secretary.

Read Also

Arts Council Election Marred by Politics and Accusations

In addition, Abdul Aziz Senghor of Abb Tak News, Abdul Rashid Memon from Daily Kavish and KTN, Abdul Wasi Qureshi from Aghaz Daily, Hamid-ur-Rehman Awan from Dunya News, Muhammad Farooq Sami from ARY News, Muhammad Nabeel from BBC and Salman Saadat Khan from Geo News have been nominated from the panel.

Number of Voters

Some 1,493 voters will exercise their voting right in the Karachi Press Club Election 2021.

First woman nominated for Vice-President

Democrats panel has nominated Shazia Hassan from Dawn for the post of Karachi Press Club Vice President. This is the first time in the history of the club that it has been done so.

However, disappointingly, the overall representation of women in terms of nominations is low.

Commenting on this, the male journalists said that their female counterparts stay away from the politics of the press club as it gets hard for them to maintain work-home balance.

The journalists were of the view that due to the nature of the job, it happens several times that the officials of the KPC have to meet which is probably not possible most of the time for women.

Other loopholes

National Press Club has three reserved seats for females, unlike Karachi Press Club.

Therefore, in Islamabad and Rawalpindi, female journalists automatically have more representations than KPC.

However, the journalists associated with KPC leaders said that they did not want to restrict female representation by reserving seats. “They could even be nominated on more seats only if they become more active”.