KSA dates case: Court seeks report from food ministry

Clearance of dates’ consignment to take at least another week.

ISLAMABAD: A 350kg consignment of Saudi dates will remain at the airport for at least one more week as the Islamabad High Court (IHC) has sought report from the director general of the Ministry of Food over the matter.

Justice Athar Minallah directed the food ministry official to submit reply within a week.

The directions came in connection with the consignment of Saudi dates, ordered by the head of the International Islamic University Islamabad (IIUI), being held at the Benazir Bhutto International Airport due to issues with paperwork.

At the previous hearing, the court had directed that “appropriate action” be taken in the matter and had granted time to the in-charge of the quarantine department, Shahid Abdullah, to seek instructions from the competent authority to resolve the issue. When the case was taken up on Monday, Abdullah appeared before the court but could not provide satisfactory answers to the questions raised by the court.

Subsequently, Justice Minallah ordered the DG to submit a reply within a week.

IIUI Director Abdullah Al-Afifi had sought the IHC’s intervention after the consignment, imported from Saudi Arabia, was held at the airport because the required Saudi documents were in Arabic rather than bilingual — English and Arabic.

The importer had instead attached a translation.

Justice Minallah had issued notice to the Ministry of National Food, Security and Research, after Al-Afifi filed a petition seeking release of the consignment at the earliest.

Al-Afifi claims that the consignment contains perishable items and was detained without any justification.

He maintained, through his counsel Rehanuddin Khan Golra, that the customs authorities had no objection to the shipment, but food ministry officials stopped the consignment and ordered that a quarantine certificate issued by the Saudi Ministry of Agriculture be produced.

Golra said the petitioner produced a quarantine certificate issued in Arabic and translated into English.

He added that the phytosanitary certificate bears a declaration that the contents of the certificate were according to the quarantine requirements of Pakistan.

However, a food ministry official demanded the production of a bilingual quarantine certificate issued by the Saudi ministry.

Entomologist Dr Huma of the food ministry wrote on the application of
the petitioner that the shipment did not contain any of the required legal documents and could not be released. The petitioner has prayed the court that the doctor’s order be set aside and that directions to accept the quarantine certificate and release of the shipment be issued.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 21^st, 2016.