Ayla Malik's degree a case of 'technical lacuna': Imran Khan

Khan questioned SC's and ECP’s inability to verify all votes by fingerprint readers in the four provinces.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairperson Imran Khan said that PTI leader Ayla Malik's intermediate degree was not fake, but was a case of a 'technical lacuna', Express News reported.

A two-member tribunal comprising justices Mamoon Rasheed and Ayesha A Malik had earlier declared PTI candidate for NA-71 Ayla Malik ineligible to contest the by-elections based on the Rawalpindi Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education’s (RBISE) finding that her intermediate (FA) degree was forged.

Advocate Zameer Sheikh, the lawyer for petitioner Ubaidullah Shadikhail, a PML-N candidate who challenged Ayla’s education credentials, argued before the court that the FA degree of the candidate is fake and this was also confirmed in a written reply from the RBISE.

Khan said that the ECP was discriminating against the PTI and favouring other political parties.

Giving an example of such discrimination, the PTI Chairman said that the ECP had allowed a PML-N candidate to take part in re-elections in the NA 103 constituency of Hafizabad, but a PTI candidate who had more evidence and more petitions highlighting rigging had been referred to tribunals.

“Why wasn’t PML-N’s candidate referred to the tribunals as well?” he asked.

He added that a PML-N candidate on a plea bargain with the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) had been allowed to take part in elections.

'ECP, SC responsible for rigging in general elections'

In a press conference on Tuesday, the PTI Chairperson launched a scathing attack on the Supreme Court and the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for failing to address the rigging that took place in the May 11 general elections.

Imran questioned the Supreme Court’s and ECP’s inability to verify all votes by fingerprint readers in the four provinces. He said that all political parties had a right to information which the Supreme Court and the ECP should honour, and that political parties could even count the votes themselves if they were presented with counterfoils.

He said that the Returning Officers (RO) played a big role in election rigging.

Speaking about the voting process in India, Khan said that the reason why 400 million people in India went to vote and accepted election results without chaos was the biometric system they had implemented. He said that PTI was trying its best to introduce a biometric system before the next KPK local elections.

Combating terrorism

In light of the recent attack by Tehreek-e-Taliban insurgents on the Central Prison in Dera Ismail Khan, who managed to escape with 230 prisoners including suspected militants, Khan said that PTI needed some time to combat terrorism in Khyper Pakhtunkhwa (KPK).

He said that KPK had no independent intelligence on terrorist attacks, but had to refer to the federal government for intelligence reports.