Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Sohail Afridi on Monday submitted before the Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) that there is no armed component to the “Imran Khan Release Force,” adding it was a peaceful, unarmed and voluntary civic initiative.
Responding to a petition challenging the legal status of the “force,” he said the organization had yet to be constituted, notified or operationalized. “No armed structure, organizational militancy, coercive framework or paramilitary setup exists or has been contemplated,” he responded to the petitioner’s arguing that the force violated the Constitution and posed a threat to public order.
According to Afridi, the Imran Khan Release Force aims to be a peaceful, unarmed, voluntary, civic and political movement with a primary objective of raising public awareness about due process of law and the state’s responsibility to act fairly in initiating criminal prosecution.
The force, he continued, has no element of force, militancy or coercion. Referring to the petitioner likening the force to historical organizations such as the Al-Zulfiqar Organization, Afridi said this view was entirely misplaced, factually incorrect, misleading and legally untenable.
The reply further argued such comparisons are based on political conjecture, generalizations and historical references that have no nexus with the present facts and cannot be used to infer illegality, militancy or a threat to public order. It said the chief minister’s responsibilities are confined to public welfare, development, governance and the well-being of the people of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.
Decisions on forming the movement, read the reply, fall within the domain of the political party and its organizational structures, not within the constitutional or administrative functions of the chief minister acting in his official capacity. It maintained Afridi, as KP chief minister, has neither the authority nor the mandate to unilaterally constitute any such political or organizational movement in an official capacity. Therefore, the allegation is legally misconceived and factually misplaced, it stressed.
Raising objections over the maintainability of the petition, the chief minister argued that the constitutional petition was liable to be dismissed as it was premature, speculative, hypothetical and based solely on conjectures and apprehensions without any actual or imminent violation of rights.
The rejoinder also contended the petitioner had failed to establish any locus standi, legal injury or enforceable cause of action against the respondents. “The petition is politically motivated, misconceived, and based on misrepresentation of facts, intended to distort lawful political activity into an alleged unlawful enterprise,” it said, objecting further that the petitioner had not approached the court with clean hands and had selectively misquoted and mischaracterized statements.
Afridi said the petition suffered from vagueness, lack of material particulars and absence of evidence, making it liable to dismissal on that ground as well. He requested the FCC to declare the “Imran Khan Rehai Aman Movement” a lawful and constitutionally protected civic and political movement under Articles 16, 17 and 19 of the Constitution.