ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Friday announced to hold the proceedings of foreign funding case on a daily basis to decide this case within 30 days in compliance with the order of the Islamabad High Court (IHC).

Earlier on Thursday, the IHC directed the electoral body to decide this case within 30 days.

A three-member ECP bench led by Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja, and comprising of Nisar Ahmed Durrani and Shah Muhammad Jatoi is hearing foreign funding case.

Presently, the proceedings of the case related to Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) are pending in the electoral body.

The three-member scrutiny committee that probed the finances of foreign funding case related to PTI submitted its report in November last year. The electoral body resumed hearing of the case in December.

However, the scrutiny committee related to Pakistan Muslim League Nawaz (PML-N) and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) is yet to submit its report to the electoral body.

PTI, PML-N, and PPP’s funding cases should be decided together: Farrukh Habib

The PTI has repeatedly demanded of the ECP to ensure that the scrutiny panel’s reports related to PML-N and PPP are completed and submitted to the electoral body at the earliest.

Last month, the ECP reconstituted the scrutiny committee to investigate the finances of PML-N and PPP in foreign funding case.

The reconstituted four-member committee is led by Director General Law ECP Muhammad Arshad and comprises of ECP Director General Political Finance Masood Akhtar Sherwanee, Additional Secretary Administration ECP Manzoor Akhtar Malik and Khurram Raza Qureshi from Auditor General of Pakistan (AGP).

Sherwanee also belonged to AGP and was part of the three-member scrutiny committee that probed the finances of the PTI and submitted report to the ECP in foreign funding case.

That committee was also led by DG Law ECP and also had Controller Accounts Air Force Muhammad Faheem as its member but it became dysfunctional following Sherwanee’s retirement from AGP. He has been employed in the electoral body.

In November 2014, Akbar Sher Babar, one of the founding members of PTI, moved the ECP accusing the PTI of being a foreign funded party and seeking action against it in accordance with related constitutional provisions.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022