No-go zone: SHC bars Afaq’s representative from practising

KARACHI:

The Sindh High Court has said that the human rights campaigner who was given power of attorney to represent Afaq Ahmed cannot practise law under this garb.

Syed Iqbal Kazmi, who runs his own NGO, was representing Ahmed, who is the chairman of his own faction of the Mohajir Qaumi Movement.

Kazmi had moved a miscellaneous application in a petition already filed by Afaq Ahmed. In it he had requested the court to order the inspector general of police to disclose the details of any cases lodged or pending against Ahmed.

Kazmi submitted that the MQM-H leader had already let his lawyers go in the petition after the legal adviser for the party, advocate Sohail Anjum, was killed and their other lawyers were harassed. Kazmi asked the court to pass orders so that Ahmed could personally argue his petition in court.

But then, the division bench, headed by Chief Justice Mushir Alam, ordered that as “Syed Muhammad Iqbal Kazmi is not a counsel, he cannot be allowed to practice the law under the garb of Power of Attorney.”

Published in The Express Tribune, November 2^nd, 2011.