KARACHI: The Paki­stan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) on Saturday expelled from the party its 11 elected members of the newly-formed local government for violating party directives by abstaining from voting during the election of Karachi mayor.

A notification, issued for the 11 members by PTI Sindh chapter president Hal­eem Adil Sheikh, referred to their “non-satisfactory replies or failure to respond to show-cause notices”, which were issued last week.

The absence of more than 30 elected members of the PTI on June 15 mayoral election had led to the defeat of Hafiz Naeemur Rehman, the joint candidate of the Jamaat-i-Islami and the PTI, and victory of Pakistan Peoples Party’s Barrister Murtaza Wahab as the city mayor.

The 11 members expe­lled from the party inclu­ded Asadullah, Salahu­ddin, Amjad Ali, Asim Hyder, Aslam Niazi, Zubair Musa, Suleman Khan, Azizullah, Muhammad Kabeer, Abdul Ghani and Sanobar Farhan, who were elected in different capacities from different parts of the city.

“The party [PTI] had set up a 12-member committee, comprising members of its legal wing to look into the cases of these members,” said the spokesman.

“The committee is headed by retired judge Rana Zaki. A total of 32 elected members were issued show cause notices for abstaining from the Karachi mayor election. The committee is still doing its job and found the replies of these 11 members [against the show cause notices] non-satisfactory which led to their expulsion from the party.”

Responding to question about the fate of other party members who were part of the City Council and were also issued show cause notice for abstaining from the mayoral election, Mr Sheikh said that the committee looking into the matter was ‘analysing’ their cases separately.

“Majority of them have sent replies to the show cause notices,” he said. “In several cases, their replies need more clarity and for that purpose the committee summoned and questioned them and also recorded their statements. They tried to justify their decision [to abstain from the mayoral elections] referring to the valid reasons which are being examined and analysed. These 11 members, however, failed to give any reason and some of them didn’t even bother to reply to the show cause notices,” he added.

Published in Dawn, June 25th, 2023