ISLAMABAD: The Scrutiny Committee of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) that’s looking into foreign funding of the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf has refused to investigate front accounts of four employees of the PTI’s Central Office who were authorised by the party’s finance board to collect donations from within the country and abroad.

Although PTI’s central finance secretary Siraj Ahmad had confirmed on record that the four employees were authorised to receive donations from the UAE, the Scrutiny Committee headed by ECP’s director general for law in its order observed that the onus was on the petitioner to prove that the money collected in front accounts was not transferred to PTI accounts.

“The respondent party admits that the Central Finance Board had authorised the employees to receive donations/contributions and it is not illegal to collect donations/contributions. However, he emphasised that the complainant has failed to provide any document that any amount was received by the employees and was not deposited in the party accounts,” said the committee’s order.

“While deriving wisdom from the judgement of the august Supreme Court in CP No 35 of 2016 Muhammad Hanif Abbasi Vs Imran Khan Niazi and others supra the Committee is of the view that initially burden of proof of the allegations that donations/contributions actually received by the employees of the respondent party through their personal accounts and were not subsequently deposited in the dedicated accounts of the respondent party squarely lies on the complainant. The complainant has provided only one account of the employee, namely Muhammad Arshad. However, no detail of contributions or donations collected by them is provided.

“The Committee is also of the view that the Hon’ble Commission has formulated TORs on basis of the complaint and documents enclosed therewith but has not framed any TOR with regard to scrutiny of personal accounts of the employees of the respondent party. In view of the above, the request of the complainant for requisitioning the bank statements of the employees of the respondent party is turned down and dismissed,” the order said.

The committee also dismissed the plea for summoning PTI’s central finance secretary.

The petitioner in the case, Akbar S. Babar, claims that despite “irrefutable evidence” before the committee, it refuses to investigate employee accounts, which puts que­s­tion marks against its intention to conduct a fair and transparent probe.

Published in Dawn, April 1st, 2021