The Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday ordered the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf (PTI) to satisfy the bench regarding the party’s collection of foreign funds and sources of funding, as well as an audit of its finances.
Hearing a petition filed by PML-N’s Hanif Abbasi, a three-member bench of the SC headed by acting Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Saqib Nisar asked the PTI to submit a detailed reply regarding these three points.
The Election Commission of Pakistan’s (ECP) counsel informed the court that the ECP had never been informed about the PTI’s foreign funding despite the party being required to share details of its funding with the ECP.
To this, the PTI’s legal counsel Anwar Mansoor asserted that the sources of funds obtained by the PTI were not prohibited.
The apex court maintained that the ECP held the authority to examine the funding of political parties and there could be no compromise on its authority.
Adjourning the case until tomorrow, Justice Nisar observed that the case could be forwarded to ECP for investigation through special powers and had consulted with the parties on the move.
