Bid to speed up PTI foreign funding case trips opposition

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) started investigating the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) in the foreign funding case on Wednesday.

A notice was sent by the Election Commission to both parties. According to the notice, representatives of the PPP and PML-N have been directed to present themselves before the scrutiny committee of the Election Commission on November 26. Both the PPP and PML-N have been accused of receiving illegal funds from the US and UK.

A Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) leader, Farrukh Habib, filed a petition against the PPP and the PML-N at the ECP. "The PPP and PML-N should worry about accounting for the funds they received from the US and the UK," said Farrukh Habib.

He said that both the parties were not willing to discuss the facts about their funding. He said the PML-N had used party funds to launder money. "As the petitionerin this case, I will not let the PPP or PML-N flee," he said.

He has sought cancellation of election symbols allocated to the two parties for their failure to meet legal requirements for eligibility to obtain the symbols. Already, the scrutiny committee is looking into account details of the ruling PTI, after a petition to this effect was filed way back in November 2014 by its senior member Akbar S Babar.

Meanwhile, the opposition’s Rehbar Committee demanded the Election Commission to conduct daily hearing of the foreign funding case against the PTI and decide it before the chief election commissioner completes his tenure next month. Headed by Akram Khan Durrani of JUI-F, the committee met the secretary of the ECP here at its secretariat and handed over a hand-written memorandum to him, giving a new twist to the widely-discussed case among political circles and on media. Those who were present during the media talk, included Ahsan Iqbal, Farhatullah Babar, Nayyar Hussain Bokhari, Mian Iftikhar Hussain and Senator Mir Tahir Bizenjo.

The Rehbar Committee contended in the memorandum, signed by its members, that the foreign funding case against the PTI had been pending before the Election Commission for the last five years and that the tenure of the office of the chief election commissioner and members would come to an end next month. “We urge that the case hearing may be held on daily basis and decided at the earliest during the term of the incumbent members,” the committee said.

A PTI member, who served as information secretary and vice-president and once was a close confidant of party chairman Imran Khan, Akbar S Babar, had filed the case in November 2014.

Talking to media persons outside the Election Commission Secretariat, Akram Durrani said that the opposition parties demand that the case be heard on daily basis so that there was no delay in it. He was confident that once the case was decided, there would neither be PTI, nor the government would remain. He added that some cases were being heard on daily basis while the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) summoned them (opposition members) three times a week. He urged the media to hold discussions on the foreign funding case daily.

PML-N leader Ahsan Iqbal pointed out that the PTI was hoping to impede formation of the Election Commission, while the chief election commissioner was bowing out in December so that the case hearing could not be held. He believed that the PTI foreign funding case was the biggest scandal in the history of corruption. He emphasised that the chief election commissioner must conclude the case during his tenure, adding that his party had always called for open hearing of cases. The PML-N leader alleged that the PTI was a political party that did not present its benami accounts before the Election Commission.

Nayyar Bokhari of the PPP and ANP’s Mian Iftikhar Hussain lamented that while the foreign funding case was pending for the last five years, the PTI always sought delays and submitted pleas for postponement of hearing. They believed the government as well as PTI would not be around, once the case was decided.

“Where-ever the prime minister goes, he talks about so much corruption in Pakistan and we will like to see who is corrupt after the funding case is decided, as the prime minister is hiding behind an NRO,” Mian Iftikhar said.