ISLAMABAD: After startling revelations regarding foreign funding of the ruling Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) before coming into power, the scrutiny committee of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) stated in its report that the political party under-reported Rs312 million funds and concealed bank accounts between 2008 and 2013.
The ECP scrutiny committee reported that PTI under-reported Rs312 million funds between 2008 and 2013 and a discrepancy of financial records worth Rs145 million was witnessed in FY2012-13 alone.
It has been confirmed that PTI under-reported funds and concealed dozens of its bank accounts besides receiving funds from foreign nationals and companies, whereas, questions were raised over the certificate signed by the party’s chairman for PTI audited accounts and allowing employees to receive donations in their personal accounts.
It may be noted that the report was surfaced after ECP resumed hearing of foreign funding case against PTI on Tuesday after a gap of around nine months while the case is pending since November 14, 2014.
Foreign funding case: PTI demands scrutiny of PML-N, PPP secret bank accounts
It was learnt that Wootton Cricket Limited owned by Abraaj founder Arif Naqvi had been spotted as the biggest-ever by a foreign entity that funded a whopping amount of $2 million to PTI in 2013. Arif Naqvi is a wanted person in the United States (US) over misappropriation of $230 million funds from a healthcare fund and faced arrest in the United Kingdom (UK).
It is worth mentioning here that the report was compiled on the basis of the data provided by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) which dimmed the allegations against PTI for primarily receiving funds from Israel and US or via Hawala-Hundi.
The ECP scrutiny committee had initiated a thorough inquiry into suspicious foreign funding complaints against different political parties including Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI), Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) and Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam Fazl (JUI-F).
A scrutiny committee had been formed to look into PTI bank accounts in March 2018 and it took four years to submit its report to the ECP in December last year.
On the other hand, ECP had formed a scrutiny committee to look into PML-N bank accounts in April 2018. The emergence of the scrutiny committee’s report has increased the chances of a series of revelations regarding foreign funding to other political parties including PML-N and JUI-F.
The latest development made the questions arise about the next progress on reports over foreign funding to the PML-N.