ECP body resumes scrutiny of PTI accounts

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan Scrutiny Committee met on Thursday and resumed scrutiny of PTI accounts while the petitioner Akbar S Babar’s lawyer contended that the authenticity of every document should be verified during its proceedings, not after that.

He claimed that the document, containing details of PTI funding, presented before the committee for scrutiny was fake as it was neither signed nor authenticated by the PTI auditor. Babar feared that under the cover of electoral reforms, the party funding law could be changed. The committee met here at the Election Commission Secretariat and the petitioner’s lawyer Ahmad Hassan Shah reiterated that to date, the committee had not challenged in writing single documentary evidence presented before it by the petitioner, it was learnt. To this, sources said, the committee responded that the authenticity would be decided in the final report. Shah challenged it by reiterating that the authenticity of each and every document before the committee had to be verified during the course of the scrutiny and not after as directed by the ECP in its order of August 27, 2010. He said the committee’s ToR clearly stipulates that the scrutiny has to be conducted before both parties. He said it was the primary function of the committee to authenticate and verify the documents during the scrutiny process to ensure only credible evidence is scrutinized and credible conclusions are drawn.

He said without perusal of official PTI bank statements requisitioned by the State Bank of Pakistan to cross-check the entries on donations presented before him, the scrutiny was an exercise in futility. The committee was constituted in March 2018 to scrutinise PTI accounts in one month but the process still goes on.