PTI's Gohar Khan refutes receiving ‘any message’ for dialogue

RAWALPINDI: Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan on Tuesday asserted that they did not receive ‘any message’ for dialogues nor holding any secret dialogues with the incumbent government, ARY News reported.

Speaking to journalists outside Adiala Jail, Gohar Khan said incarcerated PTI founder Imran Khan confirmed that he did not receive any message for dialogues. “We will publicly confirm if receive any invitation for talks,” he said.

Furthermore, the PTI chairman also rejected holding dialogues with the incumbent government and stated that his party would not hold any “secret talks”.

Meanwhile, he also expressed concerns over the Sunday’s by-elections in 21 national and provincial constituencies and alleged that “ballot boxes were already filled” before the polling process.

He alleged that “ballot boxes were already filled” before the polling process, and the results of Punjab seats were “pre-planned”.

Gohar Khan also castigated the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) for neither providing level playing field to the former ruling party nor took returning officers (ROs) from the judiciary.

He further said that the electoral watchdog has failed to conduct fair and free elections, announcing to hold peaceful protests on Friday against the by-election “rigging”.

Speaking of the cipher case against Imran Khan, he said that the prosecutor presented 21 witnesses who recorded their testimonies today. He complained that Khan’s lawyers were “not given a chance to present evidence in the 14-hour hearing”.

The statement came a day after the federal government removed the names of Murad Saeed among other PTI leaders, who were part of the then cabinet, from Exit Control List (ECL).

Sources told ARY News that the federal cabinet approved the removal of their names from the ECL on recommendation of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and sent copies of a notification issued in this regard to all the authorities concerned.

The names, removed from the ECL, include Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) Chief Minister Ali Amin Gandapur, Ghulam Sarwar, Parvez Khattak, Shafqat Mahmood, Ijaz Shah, Ali Zaidi, Khusro Bakhtiar, Azam Swati, Asad Umar, Omar Ayub, Mehboob Sultan, Fawad Chaudhry, Farog Naseem and Shireen Mazari.

However, names of PTI founder Imran Khan, his wife Bushra Bibi, Farah Gogi and Zulfi Bukhari were not removed from the list.