PTI founding member Akbar S Babar announced his decision on Sunday to challenge the Supreme Court’s order on the Election Commission of Pakistan’s petition seeking clarification on the apex court’s July 12 order that awarded Imran Khan’s party more parliamentary seats.

In a statement, Babar questioned how the Supreme Court could “impose an unelected individual on millions of PTI workers.” He described the ruling as “unconstitutional, illegal, and undemocratic”, adding that he would challenge the decision.

On Saturday, the SC disposed of the Election Commission of Pakistan’s petition, stating that the ECP’s request for clarification “is merely a delaying tactic.” The apex court noted that the electoral authority’s failure to perform the SC order might have consequences.

“The clarification sought by the commission in terms is nothing more than a contrived device and the adoption of dilatory tactics, adopted to delay, defeat and obstruct implementation of the decision of the Court,” the SC said in its order.

The bench comprised Justices Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Munib Akhtar, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Ayesha A Malik, Athar Minallah, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, Shahid Waheed, and Irfan Saadat Khan.

In July, a full-court bench of the Supreme Court set aside orders of the Peshawar High Court and ECP taking away reserved seats from the Sunni Ittehad Council. The court ruled that the PTI should be considered a political party and given reserved seats.

The ECP sought guidance from the SC on the statement that in absence of a valid organizational structure of PTI, who would confirm the political affiliation of the returned candidates (MNAs and MPAs) on behalf of PTI, who have filed their statements in light of the SC’s July 12 order.

Babar stated that the intra-party elections have not yet concluded, raising concerns about the apex court issuing any orders in this context. He stated: “If Barrister Gohar and others are elected in transparent party elections, we would accept them.”

Background

Members of Imran Khan’s political party, the PTI, were forced to run as independent candidates in the February general elections after the SC ruled that the party’s internal elections were flawed. As a result, the PTI candidates were not allowed to use the party’s cricket bat symbol during the campaign.

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Despite running as independents, the PTI-backed candidates won the most seats in the National Assembly. To secure the reserved seats, they joined the religiopolitical party, the SIC.

The reserved seats are allocated to different political parties in proportion to the number of general seats each party wins during elections. This is done to promote greater political representation and inclusion of these traditionally underrepresented groups in the government.

The ECP decided not to allocate the reserved seats to them on “technical grounds” and distributed the SIC’s share among other parties.