Coalition parties team meets CEC, calls for early verdict on foreign funding case

ISLAMABAD: A delegation of representatives of the ruling coalition Friday met the chief election commissioner and four members of the Election Commission, urging them to announce the PTI foreign funding case verdict early. They said it was the people’s right to know from whose agents the party had been taking money for politics.

The representatives of Pakistan Democratic Movement, Pakistan Peoples Party and MQM included former prime minister and senior Pakistan Muslim League (N) leader Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri.

Talking to the media outside the Election Commission, Abbasi said that a delegation of the PDM, Peoples Party and MQM had met the chief election commissioner and four other ECP members. He said that it was the right of the people of Pakistan to know from whom the PTI was taking money and doing politics in the country.

He said that one point upon which the meeting was held was that the prohibited funding case of the PTI had been pending for the last eight years; its decision had been reserved but not being pronounced. He explained that as per the law of the country, no party was allowed to get funding from any foreign company.

Abbasi said that PTI’s founding member Akbar S Babar had provided clear evidence in the case. “The PTI pressed in every way to stop the case and during its government, pressure was put on the Election Commission but facts cannot be changed. Imran Khan knows the facts of the prohibited funding case, therefore, he attacks the Election Commission while the Scrutiny Committee report revealed some facts. More facts will come out when the decision is announced, so Imran Khan is trying to pressurise the Election Commission to stop the decision by hurling abuses and carrying out personal attacks,” he added. “We have requested the Election Commission that it is your constitutional responsibility to come out with the report and take action accordingly, it is the responsibility of the Election Commission to decide the case at the earliest,” he contended.

Abbasi said that if a political party was doing politics by getting money from Jewish agents or doing politics by getting funding from anyone, it was the right of the people to know.