With Nawaz’s appeals, Judge Malik video scandal also restored

With the revival of Nawaz Sharif’s appeals against his conviction in the Avenfield and Al-Azizia references in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday, a video scandal allegedly linked to late judge Arshad Malik, who sentenced the former prime minister in one of the cases, was also restored.

The late Judge Arshad Malik video scandal was also revived after the Islamabad High Court entertained the appeals against former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s Avenfield Apartment and Al-Azizia Steel Mills convictions.

Former chief justice Asif Saeed Khosa had ruled in his judgment in the Judge Malik video case that the apex court did not want to interfere in the matter at that stage particularly because the an appeal relating to the matter was pending before the (IHC).

Barrister Jahangir Jadoon, former advocate general of Islamabad, told The Express Tribune that with the reinstatement of the sentence in Al-Azizia Steel Mills case, this case had also been revived and it would now be discussed in the IHC.

He said that Nawaz’s appeals had been restored, but the question arose, why did the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz supremo did not go to jail. However, according to the senior lawyer, there could be two reasons.

First that the Punjab government had suspended the sentence of Nawaz in the Al-Azizia reference and the second; when the appeal against the sentence in Avenfield was reinstated, the suspension of the sentence in the case was also restored.

Jadoon also pointed to the responses of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to repeated court queries that Nawaz should not be arrested. It seemed that if NAB had the authority to withdraw the reference at this stage, it would already have withdrawn it, he added.

Then accountability court judge, Arshad Malik, had convicted Nawaz in the Al-Azizia Steel Mill reference in 2018. Later a video released by PML-N leader Maryam Nawaz showed the judge “confessing” to convicting Nawaz under duress.

In July, 2020 an administrative committee of the Lahore High Court (LHC) sacked Arshad Malik from service for misconduct on the basis of an investigation into the video. Questions were raised about the Al-Azizia reference decision when the video scandal surfaced.

According to some legal experts, now the IHC could make two decisions, to remand the Al-Azizia reference back to the accountability court or decide the fate of this appeal itself. The experts believed that the Supreme Court also had the authority to decide this appeal.