Web Desk (LTN NEWS): Friday, Imran Khan, the leader of the PTI, told his supporters to stop their protest and said he would go to court to fight the decision against him by the Election Commission in the Toshakhana case. Imran thanked his supporters for coming out in the streets to show their support for him in a video message released after he led a marathon party meeting to discuss options after the ECP decision.
He said again that the mafia was trying to eliminate Pakistan’s largest party. On May 25, he and Shahbaz Gill were accused of terrorists, and innocent people were tortured. The former prime minister said that he already knew about the decision in the reference and that he had told his party members at night that the ECP would disqualify him, and in the morning, he told all of them on WhatsApp.
“I’m going to fight these thieves with everything I have. The mafia controls the Election Commission. As long as I’m alive, I’ll keep fighting them,” he said, and he said that Chief Election Commissioner Sikandar Sultan Raja was unfair.
“If the prime minister and ministers get gifts, they have to go to Toshakhana, and the law says they can buy them for half price,” he said. He said the coalition in power was trying to “shut him up.” But he swore he would fight the “thieves” until he died. He told his followers to stop their protests because people were having trouble.
At the same time, he told them to get ready for the long march that the party was planning.
“I said I would hold a long march by the end of the month. I’ll have the biggest demonstration. My movement for real freedom will keep going until the law is the most important thing. Pakistan is at a point of no return. Allah wants us to stand up to these crooks. We can’t get rid of them until we’re ready to fight against them.”
Imran said at the end that he would start the long march.
Imran said that the PMLN leader Muhammad Nawaz Sharif and the former president Asif Zardari had broken the law of Toshakhana. Imran said that the code used to bring down his government still existed.
Read Imran Khan gives 72 hours to prepare for the long march
Imran said that the courts had ruled that he was “Sadiq and Ameen” and that people were trying to make him look like Nawaz Sharif. He said that the other political parties in Pakistan had become “family parties.”
Imran was upset that he was being compared to Nawaz Sharif in his message. He said, “Nawaz Sharif is a thief. Big palaces belong to his children.”
The former prime minister said that he used to play cricket and had bought a flat 34 years ago when asked about the legitimacy of his property. “I bought the apartment with money that was legal. He said, “I sold it and took the money to Pakistan.”
Imran asked, “What happened when East Pakistan split off us?” He was talking about the chaos on the streets and roads after the ECP decision. On the other hand, the PTI leadership didn’t agree with the decision and said that the people of Pakistan were with Imran Khan.
Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the leader of the PTI, told the media today we all say that we don’t accept the minus-one formula. The people of Pakistan are with Imran Khan because on July 17, they voted against the current leader.
Fawad Chaudhry, who used to be the information minister and is now a senior vice president of the PTI, said that the ECP’s decision was wrong because it could not get rid of Imran Khan.
Asad Umar, the leader of the PTI, said that the party will take the disqualification issue to the High Court and that this verdict won’t even stand for a few hours.
Shahbaz Gill said that PMLN Quaid Nawaz Sharif wrote the ECP verdict. He said that Nawaz Sharif’s “personal servant signed the verdict,” and people didn’t like it.
Punjab Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi said they stood with their leader Imran Khan and did not agree with him being kicked out of the party.
The chief minister said that getting rid of Pakistan’s most popular leader was a cruel joke on the country.
“We will continue to stand by our leader,” he said. Former federal minister Moonis Elahi said that getting rid of Pakistan’s most popular leader was a cruel joke on the country. “The nation will accept no decision to disqualify Imran Khan,” he said, calling it a massacre of justice.
“The captain has won and will continue to win. Yesterday and today, the captain was called Sadiq and Ameen. The Election Commission’s decision is an insult to the Constitution and the law,” he said in the end.
Barrister Ali Zafar, a PTI senator and Imran Khan’s lawyer in the Toshakhana case, told reporters that the verdict was illegal and against the Constitution because all gifts were paid for and reported on June 30.
“The gifts were also written down on the tax forms. Both the statement of assets and the tax returns showed the sold gifts, the money from the sales, and the bank accounts,” Zafar said.
He also said the tax on capital gains from selling gifts was paid. Zafar said the reference was sent under Article 62(1)(f). He also said that the Election Commission was not a court of law, so it could not disqualify anyone under the article.
“The ECP has relied on Article 63 (1)(p), which says that a person must be disqualified under any law before the reference is sent. However, this doesn’t give the ECP the right to decide on any question of disqualification. The ECP has used parts of the Elections Act called Sections 137, 167, and 173. In these parts, it says that the ECP can file a complaint with the tribunal within 120 days of when the statement was filed if there was a mistake. But it doesn’t say that the ECP can remove or disqualify a candidate,” he said.
