Web Desk (LTN NEWS): The Pakistan Democratic Movement (PDM) asked the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) on Thursday to remove Imran Khan as leader of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party.
The petition says that the former prime minister didn’t list the gifts he got from the Toshakhana on his list of assets, so he should be disqualified under article 62(1)(f) of the Constitution. This is the same part of the Constitution that led to the disqualification of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 2017.
Mohsin Shahnawaz Ranjha, a leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and an MNA, gave the reference to the ECP.
Also, NA Speaker Raja Pervaiz Ashraf is expected to send the Toshakhana reference against Imran to the election commission today. Sources say that Ashraf told PDM that he was going to file the reference yesterday and that he did so.
The plan for the law
The ruling coalition doesn’t seem ready to rest on its laurels as it prepares to lay the groundwork for a barrage of legal proceedings against the PTI after the ECP’s damning report in the prohibited funding case. This includes preparing for the possibility of launching an “operation clean sweep” against the party.
With the help of top legal eagles, the ruling PML-N hopes to fly high and turn around its flagging political fortunes. The coalition government is doing everything it can to use the constitution to corner the archrival.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif led a meeting of the PDM at the PM House in Islamabad where they decided to go to court against the PTI.
Representatives from other allied parties were also at the meeting, where they talked about different political issues and the state of the country right now.
Toshakhana Case
The Toshakhana case made headlines last year after the PIC, an independent and autonomous enforcement body set up under Section 18 of the Right of Access to Information Act, accepted an application about it and told the Cabinet Division to give information about the gifts that then-prime minister Imran Khan got from foreign dignitaries.
But the Cabinet Division went to the IHC to fight the PIC order, saying that it was “illegal.” The government at the time thought that any information about Toshakhana that was made public could hurt Pakistan’s relationships with other countries.
Still, in April, Justice Aurangzeb ruled that the Toshakhana gifts that people took home should be returned. He said that people shouldn’t be able to keep these gifts if they pay a certain amount of money. He had said that if the “information commission ordered that the information be given to the citizen [who was also a petitioner in the case], then do it,” and that “if someone had taken the gifts to their home, take them back.”
Earlier in April, when talking to the media informally about the Toshakana scandal, former prime minister Imran said that those things were given to him, so it was up to him whether or not he kept them. “Mera Tohfa, Meri Marzi [my gift, my choice],” Imran had said.
