PTI-P 'offered' bat electoral symbol, claims Pervez Khattak

• Khattak refrains from taking names as to who made him such offer.
• ECP denies offering bat symbol to PTI-P chief or anyone else.
• PTI to move PHC against ECP's ruling stripping of its symbol.

Days after the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) stripped the former ruling party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) of its "bat" symbol, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf Parliamentarian (PTI-P) chief Pervez Khattak Monday claimed that he was "offered" the symbol ahead of the upcoming polls.

Speaking to the media in Peshawar, Khattak — a former close aide of PTI founder Imran Khan — said that he turned down the offer of the electoral symbol of his previous party, reported Geo News.

The PTI-P chief, however, did not disclose any details regarding who made him such an offer.

Responding to the former defence minister's claims, the ECP has said that it has not offered the "bat" symbol to either the PTI-P chief or anyone else.

The former defence minister parted ways with the PTI and formed his own party after the May 9 riots — triggered after Khan's arrest in a graft case — which saw several military installations being vandalised across the country.

Khattak's remarks come as Khan's party is facing problems of its own with its participation in the upcoming polls — slated for February 8, 2024 — after the ECP declared its intra-party polls "unlawful" and subsequently revoked the party's "bat" electoral symbol.

“The PTI has not complied with our directions [...] and failed to hold the intra-party election in accordance with the PTI prevailing Constitution, 2019, and Election Act, 2017, and Election Rules, 2017,” the electoral body said in its order.

The top electoral body announced its verdict in response to a petition filed by ex-PTI member Akbar S Babar who had moved the ECP seeking fresh polls alleging that the intra-party polls were "fraudulent".

Following ECP's verdict that the polls were not in line with the rules, the party not only had its symbol taken away, but it was also left without a chairman — as Barrister Gohar Khan’s election as party chairman was declared illegal.

With the prospects of its iconic "bat" symbol being allotted to another party after the Hum Awam Pakistan Party's (HAPP) request to the ECP for the allocation of the said symbol, the PTI has announced to move the Peshawar High Court (PHC) on Tuesday to regain its electoral symbol.

“We will try our best to ensure that our petition’s taken up for a hearing tomorrow. We will be appealing to the court to nullify the election commission’s decision and term it illegal,” PTI central spokesperson Moazzam Butt told Geo News.

Apart from drawing PTI's ire, the verdict has also raised the eyebrows of politicians and analysts.

Speaking to The News, Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) Senator Raza Rabbani said that the electoral body's ruling could affect the credibility of upcoming polls.

“It would have been better if PTI was allotted the bat [symbol]," he said.

Meanwhile, political analyst Mazhar Abbas had told Geo.tv that the election commission has “never” declared any political party’s internal polls unlawful, noting that it seems like the PTI is “under attack”.