ISLAMABAD: Dealing a major blow to Imran Khan, the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has rejected his nomination papers that he had filed from two constituencies. The papers of his several stalwart colleagues have also been rejected. Imran’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party claimed that the rejections came on flimsy grounds.
Barring a last intervention by the courts, the doors on former Pakistan PM participating in the general elections due in February have been shut. His party’s media team members stated on Saturday that Imran was disqualified after he was convicted of corruption. However, Imran still went ahead and filed his nomination papers on Friday. He has been imprisoned since August when he was sentenced to three years of imprisonment for illegally selling state gifts as a PM.
“The returning officers of the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) have rejected Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) founder Imran Khan’s nomination papers for two national assembly seats – Lahore (NA 122) and Mianwali (NA-89),” the office of the Returning Officer, Lahore, said. Besides the main reason that Khan was convicted in the Toshakhana case, objections were raised against his nomination papers as the proposer and seconder for the PTI’s founder did not belong to the respective constituencies.
Although Imran’s sentence was suspended by the Islamabad High Court, his disqualification still stands. “The objections, raised by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) Mian Naseer, had referred to Khan’s five-year disqualification in the Toshakhana case wherein the electoral body had found him guilty of corrupt practices.
Khan, 71, and his senior party colleague and former foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi have been facing multiple cases and arrests since the May 9 riots with both incarcerated at the Adiala jail in Rawalpindi.
A Pakistan court on December 28 sent Qureshi to a 14-day judicial custody in a fresh case linked to the May 9 attack on military installations.
The ECP also rejected Qureshi’s nomination papers from Multan’s two seats. Former federal minister and PTI leader Hammad Azhar’s nomination papers too were rejected on the last day of the scrutiny of nomination forms for general seats.
The other leaders included Murad Saeed, Sahibzada Sighbatullah, Dr Amjad Khan, Fazal Hakim Khan, Mian Sharafat, and Salim ur Rahman. The PTI claimed the papers were rejected on flimsy grounds.