Urging it to conduct an “audit” of at least 30 per cent of the national and provincial assembly seats to unearth the brazen “intervention and fraud” during the elections before considering any further bailout talks with the cash-strapped country.
The 71-year-old Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) party founder had announced last week that he would ask the Washington-based International Monetary Fund (IMF) to avoid any assistance as the authorities rigged the electoral outcome to keep his party out of power. His nominated chairman of the party, Gohar Ali Khan, addressing a press conference with party secretary General Omar Ayub Khan, on Wednesday confirmed the letter addressed to IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva by party spokesperson Raoof Hasan under the guidance of Khan.
It begins with a clarification that the party was not against the IMF facility to Pakistan.
“It must be clarified at the very outset that the PTI does not wish to stand in the way of any IMF facility to the state of Pakistan that promotes the immediate as well as the long-term economic well-being of the country,” the letter read. But it added that the IMF facility should be linked with conditions.
“It is clear that such facility, along with the national commitment to bring about necessary reforms that facilitate repayment and enable the country to stand on its own feet, can only be negotiated in the best interests of the people of Pakistan by a duly elected government that has the trust of the people of Pakistan,” it stated.