ISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) sought a written reply from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Tuesday in the foreign funding case with respect to a petition that accused the ruling party of receiving funds from prohibited sources.
ECP bench heard the petition filed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in which Faisal Chaudhry, party’s counsel, appeared before the officials. The PTI petition demanded scrutiny of the accounts of PML-N to determine whether the latter received funds from prohibited sources under the election laws.
The PML-N’s lawyer requested time to respond to the allegations when asked about the ruling party’s position on the matter.
ECP has told PML-N to submit its written response by today. The bench, headed by Chief Election Commissioner Sardar Raza, adjourned hearing till March 6.
On February 19, PTI submitted a petition against PML-N and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) in party funding case.
The PTI’s counsel explained to the bench that a reply was submitted by PML-N’s Raja Zafarul Haq with ECP on January 22, after the first hearing on the case that had taken place on December 22 last year. He asserted that the PTI does not agree with the reply submitted by the PML-N in this regard.
Later on, the PPP counsel submitted an affidavit without the signature of party’s chief on it. The election commissioner directed the PPP counsel to re-submit the affidavit along with the signature of an authoritative figure of the party.
In September 2017, PTI had moved the Supreme Court, requesting it to declare the PML-N and the PPP as foreign-funded parties, for “receiving funds from forbidden sources”.