ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf vice chairman Shah Mehmood Qureshi said on Wednesday that the party had sought time from the Supreme Court over judges’ proposal to form a commission to investigate the Panama Papers scam because the party leadership wanted to have a broad-based and thorough consultation before taking a decision on the issue.

Talking to Dawn after attending a meeting of PTI leaders at the Banigala residence of party chairman Imran Khan, Mr Qureshi said they had discussed the legal and technical aspects of the option of forming a judicial commission and the discussion would continue on Thursday.

Responding to a question, he said the party leadership had earlier declared that there was no need to form the commission, believing that the five-judge bench was competent to decide the case, but it had now decided to once again look thoroughly into the option given by the SC.

Moreover, he said, it was not possible for them to consult so many people in the party when the SC had given them only 15 minutes to respond to the proposal.

When asked if there had been no discussions earlier on the matter since the party’s leaders had been meeting almost daily since the beginning of the hearing of the case, Mr Qureshi said that the situation was evolving every day.

He said they wanted to have further intra-party debate on the matter in the light of the arguments which their lawyers had made before the court and the replies given by the government team. He said that they would also like to hear the viewpoint of the party’s lawyers before submitting a final reply to the court on Friday.

Mr Qureshi said the government had so far failed to give replies to the basic questions raised by the PTI in the petition. Besides, he said, the government’s lawyers did not give any “solid replies” to the three questions put before them by Justice Asif Saeed Khosa on Tuesday.

He said the PTI wanted to see early conclusion of the case as the government had come to a standstill and now the entire cabinet was busy in defending the prime minister and his family.

Earlier, talking to reporters outside the SC, the PTI chairman said the nation wanted the present judges to decide the case. However, he said, since the judges had given the option of forming a commission, they would hold consultations as to what should be the terms of reference (ToR) for the commission.

Mr Khan reiterated his demand for the prime minister’s resignation, saying that Mr Sharif should step down on moral grounds to enable the National Accountability Bureau and Federal Investigation Agency to hold fair investigations.

Replying to a question, Mr Khan denied that the court had reprimanded them for failing to produce evidence. Instead, he said, the court had simply stated that the documents submitted by both parties required verification. Speaking on the occasion, Mr Qureshi said that the court wanted to set up a one-member commission which would report back to the five-judge bench to make a final decision.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif also consulted the members of his legal team and some close political aides to discuss the SC’s option.

One of the participants of the meeting told Dawn on condition of anonymity that no final decision had been made in the meeting, but there seemed to be a consensus that the government would not support formation of the judicial commission.

“We have ourselves asked the court to hold day-to-day hearing of the case as we want to end the stalemate as early as possible,” he said, adding that the formation of the commission would further delay the matter and provide an opportunity to the opponents to continue to create a crisis-like situation in the country.

He, however, said there was a possibility that they might leave the matter for the court to decide, but would not support formation of the commission.

Published in Dawn, December 8th, 2016