ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Tuesday rejected a plea for the submission of fresh evidence in the PTI foreign funding case, including details of ‘illegal foreign funds’ received by the party from Denmark and Middle East and allegedly concealed from the Supreme Court and the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

When a member of the ECP asked why new evidence was being submitted when the petitioner would have the opportunity to submit all the evidence once investigations started into the PTI accounts, the petitioner’s senior counsel Syed Ahmed Hasan said new and damming evidence of illegal foreign funding to the PTI allegedly concealed from the ECP continued pouring in from PTI members voluntarily.

He said the evidence included funding from Denmark, Kuwait, Bahrain, UAE and Saudi Arabia.

PTI’s Finance Secretary Azhar Tariq said all documents had been submitted in accordance with the orders of the high court. He wondered how the petitioner knows which documents had been submitted and which had not when the same were confidential in nature.

The evidence petitioner Akbar S. Babar wanted to share with the ECP included the trail of allegedly illegal funds collected in the Middle East and transmitted through concealed private accounts.

The money trail of funds transmitted from Denmark to PTI accounts in Islamabad, which have never been revealed in the party’s audit reports submitted to the ECP annually.

It also included a document that showed that PTI membership coordinators all over the Middle East were selected on the condition that they would “submit 20 members data and payment” each. The entire collections and transmittal details of funds from the Middle East have been allegedly concealed from the apex court and the ECP.

The ‘evidence’ also reveals that Imran Khan’s friend and chief organiser PTI Middle East Zulqurnain Ali Khan was lauded by the party chief in a certificate of appreciation for his role in fund raising in the Middle East. However, the entire alleged illegal fund collection and transmittal to Pakistan remain totally concealed from the evidence submitted by PTI to the Supreme Court and the ECP. The evidence of fund raising included from countries in the Middle East that bar political activities and fund raising on their soil.

The hearing of the foreign funding case was adjourned to February 7.

In a related development, the ECP rejected as incomplete details of the under-challenge PTI intra-party elections.

Chief Election Commissioner retired Justice Sardar Mohammad Raza observed that the PTI had not provided the material in accordance with the December 13 judgment. He said details of votes secured by the panel and original result sheet had not been provided and directed submission of the documents by the next date of hearing. The petition challenging the intra-party elections of PTI will now come up for hearing on Jan 24.

Published in Dawn, January 17th, 2018