ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Monday reserved its verdict on former Prime Minister Imran Khan’s plea seeking the suspension of a three-year jail sentence in a case involving the sale of state gifts, with his party saying the judgment would be announced tomorrow, Tuesday.
Khan was convicted and jailed by a trial court earlier this month on charges of unlawfully selling state gifts that he and his family acquired during his tenure from 2018 to 2022. He was subsequently barred by the election regulator from politics for five years on Aug. 8.
Under Pakistani law, a convicted person cannot run for any public office for a period defined by the ECP, which could be up to a maximum of five years starting from the conviction date.
“11am tomorrow morning [Tuesday],” a member of Khan’s media team said in a text message to reporters when asked when the verdict, reserved by the IHC on Monday, would be announced.
A two-member IHC bench comprising Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Tariq Mehmood Jahangiri heard the case on Monday, as the Election Commission of Pakistan’s lawyer, Amjad Parvez, presented his closing arguments in the case. Khan’s lawyer, Latif Khosa, completed his arguments last week.
The PTI’s petition against the conviction has called it “without lawful authority, tainted with bias,” and said Khan, 70, had not received an adequate hearing. It said the court had rejected a list of witnesses for the defense a day before reaching its verdict, calling this a “gross travesty of justice, and a slap in the face of due process and fair trial.”
Khan has been at the heart of political turmoil since he was ousted as prime minister in a vote of no-confidence last year, raising concern about Pakistan’s stability as it grapples with an economic crisis.
With Khan out of the political picture for now, all eyes should be turning to an upcoming election due in November but widely expected to be delayed, fueling fears of more public anger and political uncertainty.
