Justice Umar Ata Bandial of the Lahore High Court on Tuesday referred to the chief justice a petition seeking the disqualification of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani.
Advocate AK Dogar, the petitioner, submitted to the court that the matter was of a sensitive nature and should be considered by a larger bench. The judge agreed and referred the case to the chief justice.
At the last hearing, Justice Bandial said that if the government did not file a response to the petition, which accuses the prime minister of treason and subverting the Constitution, the court would be forced to appoint an amicus curae (friend of the court) and proceed with the case. The federal government did not file a response on Tuesday.
The petition alleges that the prime minister has defied a series of orders passed by the Supreme Court as well as the High Court, and weakened the federation as well as parliament in the process.
According to the petition, Gilani deliberately violated court orders and sought to subvert the Constitution, hence the courts should declare him to have ceased holding the office of prime minister by automatic operation of provisions in Articles 5, 6 and 92 (2) of the Constitution.
Apart from violating the Supreme Court’s orders concerning the National Accountability Bureau chairman, the prime minister had “attacked” it through Zulfiqar Mirza and a general strike call, said the petition. This “playing of the Sindh card” was an “open threat” to the federation, it said.
The petitioner also condemned the prime minister as a “mere puppet” controlled by President Asif Ali Zardari. This “dictatorship of Mr Zardari in the garb of democracy” subverted parliament, it said.
Published in The Express Tribune, October 5th, 2011.
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