ISLAMABAD: The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) is going to move the Supreme Court today (Friday) against the Islamabad High Court (IHC)’s verdict in the Toshakhana case barring party founder Imran Khan from contesting the elections.
In yet another blow to the incarcerated PTI supreme leader ahead of the upcoming general elections, the IHC had on Thursday dismissed his plea seeking suspension of the trial court’s verdict in the Toshakhana case.
As a result, Khan, the only prime minister voted out from office in Pakistan’s more than 70-year-long history, remains disqualified from contesting elections. The court’s ruling came a day before the deadline to submit nomination papers for polls for national and provincial assemblies scheduled for February 8, 2024.
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The 70-year-old cricketer-turned-politician was sent to jail for three years on August 5 this year after being found guilty of selling state gifts illegally during his 2018-22 tenure as prime minister — the charges he denies.
Imran Khan’s lawyer and spokesman on legal affairs, Naeem Haider Panjutha said on X that Imran Khan’s request to suspend the decision in the Tosha Khana criminal case was dismissed so that disqualification remains in place.
IHC’s two-member bench — comprising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri — said in its decision that the PTI founder’s petition was not maintainable.
Sardar Latif Khosa, who recently left the Pakistan Peoples’ Party to join the PTI, alleged that the lower court’s conviction of Imran Khan was tantamount to “jurisdictional incapacity”.
