Dual office: LHC asks petitioner to argue on petition maintainability

JI petition calls for proceedings under Article 6 against president.

LAHORE: Lahore High Court Justice Nasir Saeed Sheikh on Monday directed the petitioner, the Jamaat-i-Islami (JI), to argue on the maintainability of their petition against the alleged political office held by President Asif Ali Zardari on next date of hearing.

The judge observed that if the petition was found maintainable, it would be referred to a full bench already hearing a similar matter.

Earlier, the counsel submitted an authority letter issued by JI in favour of its deputy secretary Dr Farid Ahmad Paracha allowing the advocate to file an instant petition.

The full bench hearing the contempt of court matter against the president had referred the JI petition to a single bench.

The petition seeks a declaration that President Zardari suffered from pre-election disqualification for retaining political party office when he filed his nomination papers for the presidential election.

It states that the respondent (the President) has continued his political activities while head of state. It says meetings of the core committee of the ruling political party are regularly held at the Presidency and the expenses are met from the public exchequer.

It says a LHC full bench had on May 12, 2011 directed the president to disassociate himself from the political party office at the earliest. However, they said the respondent had disobeyed the order as well as the Constitution. It says the court must declare that the respondent was not qualified to contest the presidential election when he submitted his nomination papers.

The petition says that deliberate insistence of the President to continue as head of a political party attracts legal action under Constitution Article 6 in light of the recent judgment passed by the Supreme Court in the Asghar Khan case.

It asked the court to set aside the proviso in Section 3 of the High Treason (Punishment) Act 1973 which empowers the federal government to initiate proceedings under Article 6 of the Constitution as being in violation of fundamental rights of access to justice.

Published in The Express Tribune, November 27^th, 2012.