ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) filed a complaint against the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) and the members of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) before the Supreme Judicial Council for violating the constitutional provisions and the Supreme Court’s verdicts.
The PTI and its General Secretary Omar Ayub, on Saturday, submitted the complaint against the CEC Sikandar Sultan Raja and the ECP members – member Punjab Babar Hassan Bharwana, member Sindh Nisar Ahmed Durrani, Member Balochistan Shah Muhammad Jatoi, and member KPK Justice (retired) Ikramullah Khan under Articles 215(2) and 209(5) of the Constitution.
The complainants said that the ECP has violated and breached its constitutional duties, obligations and responsibilities to conduct elections honestly, justly, fairly, and in accordance with the law and to guard against corrupt practices.
PTI demands resignations of CEC
The complainants request the immediate removal of the ECP (Chief Election Commissioner and Members) due to serious allegations of misconduct, including pre-poll, poll day and post-poll riggings as detailed below. The complainants seek accountability for the unconstitutional actions of the ECP.
The CEC and the ECP members have breached Article 224 of constitution by not holding elections to the National Assembly and Provincial Assemblies of Punjab and KPK within 90 and have also acted contrary to Article 189 in openly defying the judgements dated 01.03.2023 and 04.04.2023 of the Supreme Court directing the ECP to hold elections within 90 days.
By declining to perform its primary obligation of conducting elections within the timeline devised by the Constitution, and refusing to obey the orders of the Supreme Court, the ECP not only acted illegally but this proves that ECP had unconstitutional objectives to fulfil.
The ECP executed a grand scheme to disqualify former prime minister and former Chairman PTI, Imran Khan, and removed him as Chairman of PTI, thereby, disabling him from participating in politics and damaging PTI as a political party and then to “disqualify” PTI altogether from contesting the elections.
The ECP continuing with the intention of harming and damaging PTI through illegal orders, decided that the reserved seats for women and minorities shall not be given to PTI but shall be allocated to other political parties proportionately.
Along with the attempt to keep former prime minister and Chairman PTI, Imran Khan, outside politics through illegal orders, as part of the grand plan, ECP decided to directly attack PTI and make it dysfunctional. For this purpose, ECP executed the plan to reject the intra-party election of PTI and take away its symbol for the general elections.
The ECP did not allow the PTI to contest the general election on “bat” symbol and thus, turned them into independent candidates.
The idea of ECP was to create complete chaos and confusion among the public in order to defeat PTI in election.
They said that the ECP must act independently and cannot take sides in favour of or against any political party.
Under this constitutional obligation, the ECP cannot restrict or stop any political party from functioning and carrying on political activities nor can it shut its eyes if any acts and violations are taking place due to which elections are not being conducted honestly, justly, fairly and in accordance with law.
ECP equally has a constitutional duty to guard against corrupt practices in the conduct of elections.
The ECP cannot be a participant in restricting or sabotaging the political activity of any political party ignore disregard the principles of honestly, justice and fairness in elections are being violated or acts are taking place against the law.
There is also a positive duty on ECP to guard against corrupt practices in the conduct of elections.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2024
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