ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) approached the Superior Court of Islamabad (IHC) to challenge the decision of the Electoral Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to reject their requests against an audit of the party's foreign funds.
Through a petition filed Thursday at the IHC, the ruling party asked the court to restrict the scrutiny committee formed by the Commission so that it does not investigate the party's foreign funds.
On October 10, a bank of three members of the PCE, headed by the Chief Commissioner of Elections (CEC), retired judge Sardar Mohammad Raza, had rejected four requests submitted by the PTI against the audit of their accounts by the counting committee and He ordered the panel to continue its work and submit a report as soon as possible.
Akbar S. Babar, a founding member of the PTI, had presented the case in 2014, claiming that the party had illegally raised about $ 3 million through two offshore companies, and that the money was sent through illegal channels from the Middle East to certain accounts of "PTI employees".
He also claimed that the foreign accounts used to raise the funds were not mentioned in the annual audit reports submitted to the PEC by the PTI.
The party, in one of its requests, alleged that, since the PCE that was composed of the CEC and four members, was incomplete, an approved order lacked legal force.
The scrutiny committee was formed last year to investigate the issue of foreign financing of the PTI in one month, but then the time limit was extended to an indefinite period.
During the October 1 hearing, a conversation took place between the CEC and the PTI lawyer about the disclosure that the party was operating numerous undeclared accounts.
The party's attorney argued that some of the PTI accounts may not be known to the party's central office and that the PTI could not be held responsible for their account in Azad Kashmir, as it was under other legal jurisdiction.
On August 22, President Arif Alvi had appointed Khalid Mehmood Siddiqui of Sindh and Munir Ahmed Kakar of Balochistan as members of the PCE in positions that had become vacant after Abdul Ghaffar Soomro's departure and retired judge Shakeel Baloch.
However, the ECP chief refused to administer the oath to the new members because the appointments had been made without complying with the constitutional requirements.
The PCE scrutiny committee is headed by the director general of law and is also composed of two auditors of the defense establishment.
The ECP was of the opinion that President Alvi had made these appointments "in violation of clauses 2A and 2B of article 213 of the Constitution" that forced these appointments to be made with the consensus of the prime minister and the leader of the Opposition.
However, the committee was unable to make any significant progress since the PTI did not submit financial documents, particularly bank account statements, requested by the committee.
Published on Dawn, November 8, 2019
Source: https://www.dawn.com/news/1515577/pti-challenges-ecp-decision-over-audit-of-its-accounts