PTI to hold intra-party elections

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan on Monday announced that the party will hold its second intra-party election (IPE), enabling party members to directly elect their representatives.
Speaking to media persons after presiding over a lengthy central leadership meeting here, Imran said that PTI would be transformed into an institution unlike the family parties of the status quo.
The abrupt decision was seen by some party members as a bid at face-saving in the wake of PTI’s dismal performance in local bodies elections. The issue of alleged irregularities in party funds was also perplexing the party leadership, particularly those who had made millions.
The seven-member committee, to be headed by Dr Arif Alvi, will hold consultations with the PTI Election Commission to thrash out poll modalities. The date of the IPE will be decided afterwards.
Those, who gave presentations to the forum on the LBs elections, included Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Asad Umar, Chaudhry Sarwar, Abul Hasan and Sarwar Khan. A heated exchange of arguments was also witnessed between Ch Sawar and Abul Hasan, who insisted on following the Islamabad model, being a success story in the recently-held LBs in Islamabad, insiders told The News.
Hasan, it was learnt, argued that the model of fielding young and committed party workers paid off and it was evident from Islamabad’s poll results.
Imran raised the rigging allegations in the local bodies elections and cautioned that if the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) members did not go home in June next on the expiry of their term, his party would again take to the streets against them. He alleged that Punjab and Sindh together with the ECP had rigged the elections.
The PTI chief contended that he wished his party to become an institution, being strongly opposed to making it a family party like the PPP and PML-N, which never held elections even for party office-bearers of their families.
He noted that they had seen the PPP, a federal party of the grass-roots level, being reduced to a small party, confined to the rural parts of Sindh only.
Imran pointed out that under the Charter of Democracy (CoD), the PPP and PML-N had struck a deal of ruling Pakistan turn by turn. He said the meeting had a review of the PTI electoral performance and that district-wise results of the party would be reviewed. He maintained that the local bodies elections were also a kind of accountability and certain lessons needed to be learnt.
Some participants of the meeting told The News that Imran in his motivating speech appeared to be back to his basic philosophy of running the party through elected office-bearers. This, they said, was a clear shift from his speech in August this year.
Meanwhile, in a related development, PTI’s election tribunal, headed by Justice (R) Wajihuddin Ahmad wrote a letter to Imran for implementation of the tribunal’s orders before and during the fresh IPE.
Through the letter, he reminded Imran that despite his own commitments, the order had not been fully implemented yet. The order said that all those, who held offices after the dissolution order of March 18, 2015 including those in Central Advisory Committee (CAC) ‘stand disqualified for contesting the forthcoming Intra Party Elections (IPE)’.
The following party leaders as per the order ‘stand disqualified’ to contest forthcoming PTI IPE: 1. Aleem Khan, 2. Ali Amin Ghandapur, 3. Ali Asghar Khan, 4. Ali Muhammad, 5. Ali Zaidi, 6. Amer Mehmood Kiani, 7. Amin Aslam, 8. Andleeb Abbas, 9. Asad Qaiser, 10. Asad Umar, 11. Atif Khan, 12. Azam Swati, 13. Chaudhary Sarwar, 14. Dr Arif Alvi, 15. Dr Shireen Mazari, 16. Ejaz Chaudhry, 17. Faisal Javed Khan, 18. Fauzia Kasuri, 19. Ghulam Sarwar Khan, 20. Hafeezuddin, 21. Hamid Khan, 22. Hammayun Jogezai, 23. Imran Ismail, 24. Imran Khan Niazi, 25. Ishaq Khakwani, 26. Jahangir Khan Tareen, 27. Khalid Masood, 28. Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri, 29. Mansur Sarwar, 30. Mian Mahmoodur Rashid, 31. Mufti Saeed, 32. Munaza Hasan, 33. Murad Saeed, 34. Nadir Leghari, 35. Naeemul Haque, 36. Naik Muhammad, 37. Najeeb Haroon, 38. Noor Khan Bhaba, 39. Pervez Khattak, 40. Qasim Khan Khan Suri, 41. Rai Hassan Nawaz, 42. Saifullah Niazi, 43. Samar Ali Khan, 44. Sardar Azhar Tariq, 45. Shafqat Mahmood, 46. Shah Farman, 47. Shah Mehmood Qureshi, 48. Shahzad Waseem, 49. Sohail Kamrial, 50. Syed Fidous Shamim Naqvi, 51. Syeda Saloni Bukhari, 52. Tariq Shafi, 53. Wajid Bukhari, 54. Yaqoob Izhar, and 55. Yasmin Rashid
Justice Wajihuddin criticised the party for abandoning ideology and embracing alien political cultures by welcoming self-seekers from other opposition parties and forcing party ideologues, activists and workers, to either stand sidelined or quietly beating their retreat.