PTI leaders vow to challenge rejection of nomination papers

PESHAWAR: After a brief honeymoon period, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa suffered a major setback on Saturday when returning officers rejected the nomination papers of the majority of the candidates, prompting the PTI leaders to announce they will challenge the decision in court on Monday.

PTI leaders and workers celebrated a recent verdict of the Peshawar High Court that restored the party’s election symbol, the “bat”, and expressed their commitment to participating in the election process.

However, their joy was short-lived as the nomination papers of the majority of PTI candidates were rejected by the relevant returning officers in the province.

Some PTI candidates expected such a situation, while others deemed it a “sheer violation of the Constitution of Pakistan.” They asserted that rival political parties were afraid of their popularity and wanted to keep them away from the election process.

Taimur Khan Jhagra, a senior PTI leader and former health and finance minister, said: “Like other PTI candidates, I submitted my nomination papers for the National Assembly and provincial assembly seats in Peshawar. However, they rejected my nomination papers without obvious reasons.”

“The nomination papers of almost all of the PTI candidates were rejected and no formal reasons were given. In my case, they simply mentioned on a white paper that I had not paid agricultural income tax in 2014, which never existed,” Taimur Jhagra told The News.

He said the nomination papers of almost all PTI candidates were rejected, and formal reasons were not provided. Jhagra said that they would challenge these rejections in court.

He said it was strange that his nomination papers were rejected on the agricultural income tax issues of 2014 but they never raised the issue when he contested elections in 2018.

“They should have raised this issue in the 2018 polls. They rejected 80 to 90 of our candidates and I think this is our success and it shows that they have had no answer to the popularity of PTI. And they are willing to abuse the electoral process to any extent,” Taimur Jhagra said.

Similarly, PTI senior vice president and former housing minister Dr Amjad Ali Khan told The News that he had predicted the rejection of nomination papers for all PTI candidates from the Malakand region. He said the rejection was due to their support for PTI founding chairman Imran Khan and their recommendation for schedule four.

“They rejected my nomination papers and other PTI candidates including former federal minister Murad Saeed, Salimur Rahman, Fazle Hakeem, Mian Sharafat Khan, Junaid Khan, Shakil Khan, Shafiullah Khan, Liaqat Ali Khan, Azam Khan, Humayun Khan, Bashir Khan, Sibghatullah Khan, Shaukat Yousafzai, Anwar Zaib, Gul Zafar Khan and Ajmal Khan in Bajaur,” said Dr Amjad Ali.

However, in Bajaur tribal district that is also part of the Malakand Division, the nomination papers of former PTI MPA Pir Mussawar and those of Fakhar Jihan and Riaz Khan in Buner district were cleared by the returning officers to contest elections.

He said the reason for rejection of their nomination papers was stated to be their recommendation for schedule four.

“The Malakand Division administration had led a meeting and they decided to put us all on schedule four and keep us away from contesting the election,” Dr Amjad Khan alleged.

“Even the government officials had informed us that they had decided to put us on schedule four. They advised us in advance to make proper arrangements for our future,” he claimed. When reached, the commissioner Malakand Division avoided commenting on the issue.