ISLAMABAD: The Pakis­tan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) on Monday announced that party chief Imran Khan would appear before the Election Commission of Pakistan on Oct 26.

The announcement comes on the heels of a decision made by the ECP last week when it issued non-bailable arrest warrants for Mr Khan on contempt charges.

The warrants were issued on Oct 12 following Mr Khan’s continuous failure to appear before the ECP on the show-cause notice issued for “defaming and scandalising” the ECP in the foreign funding case.

While the PTI announced that Mr Khan would appear before the commission voluntarily and without prejudice to the party’s view about the jurisdiction of the ECP on contempt, the ECP said it enjoyed clearly defined powers under the law to try and punish contemnors.

A statement issued at the conclusion of the PTI’s core group’s meeting said the primary job of the ECP was to hold fair and free elections and enforce electoral laws and the election code of conduct.

According to the statement, “the party’s core group categorically finds [that] the ECP has failed entirely in this. The core group felt the CEC [chief election commissioner] must realise the genuine grievances [the] PTI has as a result of the events and action and, in some cases, inaction during hearings against the party as well as its chairman, and in by-elections”.

It said that the lessons learnt through 40 critiques, pointed out by the Judicial Commission in the rigging case, had been ignored in all subsequent by-elections where the ECP “failed to rectify any of the lapses” in the electoral law.

“In addition, the CEC has sought to only scrutinise PTI accounts, its funding and its overseas membership despite the fact that PTI is one of the few political parties to submit details of all its accounts every year before the ECP. The CEC ignored alleged violations of the election law and code on the part of the PML-N in by-elections — like in NA-120 and earlier in NA-122 — which also led to serious issues being raised by the PTI core group.

“If the PTI as a political party cannot even state its concerns, critique of the CEC, to the public then this is a direct undermining of democratic political norms,” the PTI statement said.

Meanwhile, talking to reporters, ECP Secretary Babar Yaqoob Fateh Mohammad pointed out that the commission under the Elections Act, 2017 had unambiguous powers to punish for contempt.

Another senior ECP official told Dawn that the commission had recently approved the Election Rules 2017, Section 4 of which also defined procedure for contempt proceedings.

Published in Dawn, October 17th, 2017