ECP adjourns hearing in PTI funds case

ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) will wait until January 26 for the Islamabad High Court (IHC) decision on the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s petition and will afterwards proceed with the party’s alleged fund embezzlement case.

A four-member bench of the ECP under Chief Election Commissioner Justice (retd) Sardar Muhammad Raza Khan adjourned the hearing of the PTI’s illegal foreign funding case till February 1, 2016. The PTI lawyer, during the proceedings at the Election Commission Secretariat, pleaded that since the jurisdiction of the ECP had been challenged by the PTI in the IHC, the hearing should be adjourned.

Upon hearing that the writ petition had been adjourned until January 26, 2016, the CEC stated, “We will wait for the IHC to decide the PTI writ petition until January 26, after that we would proceed with the case whether or not the IHC decides or not.”

The PTI had filed a writ petition in the IHC in November this year after the ECP had ordered it to produce bank statements to prove it had not received illegal foreign funding. Instead of producing the accounts, the PTI filed a writ petition to avoid scrutiny of its accounts by the ECP.