Audit funds of all political parties, Fawad urges ECP

LAHORE:

Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry on Sunday demanded that the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) should audit the foreign sources of funding of all political parties and make them public.
The minister also warned the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) that the government would not spare the outfit if it went against the law.

Addressing a news conference in Lahore along with State Minister for Information Farrukh Habib, Fawad maintained that while the ECP’s scrutiny committee had audited the foreign funding sources of the PTI, it had not made any significant proceedings in the cases of the PML-N and PPP.
“The PTI had submitted the record of more than 40,000 donors consisting of around 22 volumes to the ECP so that the party’s funding sources could be made public.”

However, the minister claimed that the PML-N had under-valued its assets. “It showed the value of a house in F-7 sector of Islamabad as only Rs27 million while two transactions of Rs145 million and Rs86.7 million were also deposited in the party’s account in 2013. The source of these transactions is unknown.”

Fawad maintained that the PML-N had claimed an office in F-8 area of Islamabad but it was yet to be ascertained who was paying funds for running its financial matters. He added that the audit of PML-N’s Punjab office was not conducted from 2013 to 2015 while the balance of Rs17.5 million was available in its account without any known source of income.

The minister said that former premier Nawaz Sharif had donated Rs100 million to its party and out of that amount, Rs45 million were returned to him. “This method was used for money whitening.” Fawad also claimed that a company situated in London was collecting and arranging funds for the PML-N but still there was no record of that.

Turning his guns towards the PPP, Fawad maintained that the party’s funding information was unavailable for the period between 2009 and 2012. “The PPP had opened an account and deposited Rs420 million in it without informing the ECP about its source,” the minister added. “The PPP had also showed amounts of Rs3.6 million, Rs3.5 million and Rs2.5 million in its audited account from the period between 2013 and 2015 without mentioning the source of funding.”

Read more: Fawad apologises to ECP, CEC for acrimonious comments

Fawad said the PPP had claimed that it spent about Rs230 million during the general elections 2013, but the source was not mentioned. The minister claimed that the PPP, under the control of then Pakistan’s ambassador to the US Hussain Haqqani, had also set up a company in the US that collected funds of millions of dollars for the party without informing about their sources.

“The ECP should scrutinise the accounts of political parties in phases. The accounts of the three major political parties [PTI, PMLN and PPP] should be audited in the first phase and made public,” he demanded. He added that the accounts of the rest of the parties including Jamaat-e-Islami (JI), Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) and Tehreek-e-Labbaik (TLP) should be audited in the second phase.
Farrukh Habib on the occasion said the EPC should scrutinise the funding accounts of all registered political parties as per the directives of the Supreme Court.

“Both the PPP and PML-N are trying to hide the facts and account details. Once [former premier] Benazir Bhutto, in her book, had alleged that Nawaz Sharif had received funding from foreign elements to derail her government,” he recalled. Speaking about the TTP, Fawad said talks with the militant group were under way. “If it operates in accordance with the Constitution, then it is fine,” he added.
“Otherwise, we have fought them before and would do so in the future as well.”

The minister maintained that nobody would be allowed to challenge the writ of the State and those responsible for the Army Public School (APS) Peshawar attack in December 2014 had met their end.

A day earlier, a policeman was martyred and a Frontier Constabulary official suffered serious injuries on Saturday – both deployed for the security of polio teams -- when unidentified men on a motorcycle opened fire at them in Tank district of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, an attacked claimed by the TTP.

Also read: Fawad predicts PDM will change long march's date once again

On Friday, the TTP had called off a ceasefire with the government, accusing it of violating the terms of the agreement. Talking about the upcoming local government elections in Punjab, Fawad said for the first time in the history of the country, mayors would be directly elected in every district of the province. "They will be chief ministers in their respective districts.”

He said despite differences within the party, Prime Minister Imran Khan had fulfilled his promise of providing people with a robust local bodies system, adding that a schedule for the elections would soon be released. He rejected ECP's position that electronic voting machines (EVMs) could not be used during the local government elections. “There will be no problem in conducting the polls via the electronic machines at the provincial level.”

The minister said the ECP should take the issue of EVMs seriously now. “If it [ECP] is willing to work for it, then the machines can be arranged within two months.” He said that the local government system in Punjab and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa gave maximum powers to the local tier. Responding to Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah's statements in the Sindh Assembly, Fawad said that it was not appropriate for someone of his stature to give such statements. "He (Murad Ali Shah) often gives such statements which do not suit a chief minister of a province."

(With input from APP)