Govt ad featuring ex-CM photo: SC orders Khattak to deposit Rs1.365m in 10 days

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court Friday directed Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s former chief minister Pervaiz Khattak to deposit Rs1.365 million in 10 days for a provincial government advertisement in which his photograph featured.

A three-member bench headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar was hearing a suo motu case pertaining to media campaigns run by the governments of Sindh, KP, and Punjab. During the hearing, additional advocate general Khyber Pukhtunkhwa Zahid Yousaf submitted that Pervaiz Khattak was willing to deposit Rs1.365million and would pay the amount out of his own pocket. Meanwhile, the court allowed him to deposit the amount within a period of 10 days and sought compliance report after the payment.

In February, Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar had taken suo motu notice of the advertising campaigns run on national media by three provinces – Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sindh – to highlight their projects and asked the provincial governments to submit details of these campaigns within a week.

During the preliminary hearing of the matter, the chief justice had questioned as to whether spending huge amounts on media campaigns by provincial governments was not pre-poll rigging. The court had noted that the provincial governments, through such advertisements, were doing self-projection under the garb of informing the public about the projects completed or undertaken by them.

In the same matter, Punjab’s former chief minister and current Leader of the Opposition Shahbaz Sharif has already deposited Rs5.5 million while Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah has paid Rs1.4 million.