According to a statement made by the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Friday, its websites have been “blocked” within Pakistan in advance of the general elections that are set to take place on February 8.
Additionally, the party placed a demand for an explanation from the authorities.
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has nominated its candidates as independents with a variety of electoral symbols in order to compensate for the fact that its iconic ‘bat’ electoral symbol will not be present for the next elections.
Along with a “back-up site,” pticandidates.com, the party launched an online portal on its website, insaf.pk, in order to address the possibility of confusion among voters and to make it easier for them to acquire information connected to the election.
The official X account of the party tagged the official handles of the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), the interim information minister Murtaza Solangi, and the interim information technology minister Umar Saif.
“Are you able to provide an explanation as to why the websites of the PTI are blocked in Pakistan?” the message asked. as well as questioned the rationale behind the block, given that anyone could still acquire knowledge about symbols via Imran Khan’s account on Facebook.
Prior to this, voters were receiving inaccurate information on candidates supported by the PTI through a phony web portal that was designed to look like it had been developed by the party.
It is important to note that in the past few weeks, there have been multiple internet disruptions around the country that have coincided with the online events that have been held by the PTI. Internet services were disrupted on January 20, one hour before the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) “virtual power show.” This was the most recent disruption that happened.
It was stated that similar disruptions occurred on December 17 and January 7, which prompted the party to file an appeal with the Supreme Court, requesting that it take notice of the restriction of internet access.
In a decision that was handed down the day before, the Sindh High Court prevented the appropriate authorities from banning internet access until the general elections on February 8.
Jibran Nasir, a human rights defender and lawyer, who was running for PS-110 as an independent candidate, submitted a petition against the numerous “unconstitutional” internet outages that have occurred in the country in recent days. The order was issued in response to the appeal.
X, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube were among the main social media platforms that were disrupted as a result of the internet restrictions, which occurred at the same time as the PTI’s virtual activities. The PTI recently filed a petition with the highest court, requesting that it take immediate action against the internet suspensions.
“Problems with technology”
Interim Information Minister Murtaza Solangi stated on January 22 that “technical issues” were to blame for the recent internet outages that occurred across the country. He also stated that there was no assurance that similar situations would not recur in the future.
Internet service was disrupted, according to the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA), which stated that the cause was a “technical fault.”
“As per my information, the reasons [for disruptions] are technical, and there are some matters of system installations involved as well,” Solangi responded to a query about internet outages and whether or not the government would resolve to prevent similar instances happening during the general elections that took place on February 8.
“You can face this for the next two to three months,” said the Director General of the Public Transport Authority (PTA), Pirzada, who blamed the disruptions to “technical glitches” and system upgrades.
