ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) has requested the Supreme Court to investigate the “various aspects” of the November 3 assassination attempt on former prime minister Imran Khan which left the nation in shock.
The party said it has submitted a set of petitions to nationwide sub-offices of the apex court seeking the constitution of a trustworthy judicial commission to probe several “important matters” now in the public domain, including the attempt on Khan’s life.
Speaking to the press in Lahore, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, vice chairperson of the party, said the court has been requested through these petitions to probe the gun attack on the caravan carrying Khan; the purported refusal of police to nominate the prime minister, his minister for interior, and a senior intelligence official in the complaint; the leaked recording of moments of intimate closeness between party Senator Azam Khan Swati and his spouse; and the grisly murder of journalist Arshad Sharif in Kenya.
The petitions were filed in Lahore, Islamabad, Karachi, Peshawar and Quetta.
The former foreign minister expressed hope that Umar Ata Bandial, the chief justice of Pakistan, would consider the request.
In the Lahore registry of the Supreme Court, the petition was filed by Qureshi, former Punjab chief minister Usman Buzdar, who is also the applicant, and other lawmakers. Buzdar handed the petition to Ejaz Goraya, a deputy registrar of the court.
The petition requested the formation of a judicial commission. It implored the court to take action on its complaint by taking suo motu notice.
In Karachi, two identical pleas were submitted by 26 party lawmakers, whereas in Peshawar, Deputy Speaker Mehmood Jan, Atif Khan, Shaukat Yousufzai, Kamran Bangash, and Senator Usman Tarkai, among others, filed the petition.
Petitioners in the application filed in Islamabad were several PTI MPs and senators, including Shibli Faraz and Shahzad Waseem. In Karachi, the president of the Sindh chapter of PTI, Ali Zaidi, and Imran Ismail, former governor, were among those who reached the court registry to file the petition.
Meanwhile, former National Assembly deputy speaker Qasim Khan Suri, MP Munawara Bibi Baloch and Balochistan Assembly lawmaker Muhammad Mubeen Khan Khilji moved the plea in Quetta.
Fawad Chaudhry, senior vice president of the party, who spoke alongside Qureshi in Lahore, urged the top judge “not to weaken the institution of Supreme Court to the extent that people stop approaching it”.
He said his party was “working to restore the constitution and the respect of institutions”.
Chaudhry claimed that the institutions had caused themselves “great loss by taking wrong decisions” and that the opposition party wanted the institutions to “stand up on their own feet”.
