Foreign funding case: PTI gets big relief from IHC before protests against ECP
A two-member division bench of the IHC has suspended the court order to settle the PTI foreign funding case within 30 days.
ISLAMABAD: A two-member divisional bench of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has suspended the court order to settle the PTI foreign funding case within 30 days.
The IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah and Justice Babar Sattar heard the case and suspended the single-bench order in an intra-court appeal against Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani’s verdict in the foreign funding case against PTI.
According to details, the high court has suspended the order for asking the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to decide on the foreign funding case against Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) within 30 days.
The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) had filed an intra-court appeal against the decision of a single bench comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani of the Islamabad High Court (IHC).
After hearing the preliminary arguments of the lawyers, the IHC issued notices to the ECP and 17 political parties, seeking a reply by May 17, whereas, the notices were also issued to the ECP and Akbar S Babar on the PTI’s intra-court appeal.
Earlier, the PTI leaders Aamer Mehmood Kiani, Azam Khan Swati along with their lawyers Shah Khawar, Shiraz Ranjha and Naveed Anjum Advocate have appeared before the IHC in the PTI foreign funding case and requested to nullify the decision to decide on the foreign funding case within a month.
They pleaded with the IHC that the decision of the single bench should be suspended and an order should be issued to decide the cases against 17 other political parties besides PTI within a month.
In the intra-court appeal, the political party made Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N), Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), Awami Muslim League (AML), Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP), Balochistan Awami Party (BAP), Balochistan National Party (BNP), Awami National Party (ANP) and others as parties.
The PTI lawyer Shah Khawar Advocate argued that the ECP was acting partially by taking action against the PTI, refusing to scrutinise the accounts of 17 political parties like the PTI accounts.
He said that PTI is a party affected by the biases of the election commission. Khawar requested the IHC to order Election Commission to investigate the accounts of 17 political parties besides directing to scrutinize the bank accounts of all political parties through the central bank.
Shah Khawar argued that after a State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) report, the ECP should release the details of the accounts of political parties and direct the ECP to hear the cases of 17 political parties on a daily basis and decide within a month. The Election Commission should be directed not to be biased toward PTI.
PTI lawyers adopted the stance that PTI had also filed a case regarding foreign funding against other political parties. The IHC CJ questioned whether the accounts of other political parties were not being investigated.
To this, Khawar replied that the proceedings on the cases related to accounts of other political parties are very slow.
The IHC chief justice remarked that it is a constitutional matter and they will constitute a division bench. Later, the IHC suspended the single bench decision.
