Opposition parties to challenge Pakistan Protection Ordinance in top court
The controversial ordinance was passed on April 7 amid furore from the opposition against the bill.
The Supreme Court of Pakistan. PHOTO: AFP/FILE
ISLAMABAD:
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Tuesday announced it will challenge the recently passed Pakistan Protection Ordinance (PPO) in the Supreme Court, Express News reported.
The controversial ordinance was passed on April 7 in the National Assembly amid furore from the opposition against the bill, who termed it regressive and extra-constitutional.
The law grants sweeping powers of arrest and detention to security forces.
"This law will turn Pakistan into a police state," Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) vice chairperson told a news conference. "We have decided to take this law to court and challenge its anti-human rights stance."
Qureshi, a former foreign minister, said his party had the support of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM).
The main opposition, the Pakistan People's Party, has led protests against the law in the National Assembly.
When the National Assembly approved the bill, opposition party members tore up copies and threw them in the air and walked out of the assembly in protest.
The law permits the security forces to shoot suspects on sight, detain them at secret locations for up to 90 days and carry out raids without search warrants. The security forces can also carry out secret trials.
Background
PPO – approved by President Mamnoon Hussain last year – is a decree that declares all peace-disrupting elements as ‘enemies of the state’, and states protection of life to be the state’s top priority.
Below are a few clauses from the ordinance:
• Every possible state instrument and resource will be deployed to defeat and frustrate all or any nefarious attempt to create disorder.
• The cancer of syndicated crime, in all its forms and manifestations, shall be responded by proportionate use of state force under the law.
• Joint investigation teams shall be constituted to conduct investigations by security agencies and police in all heinous crimes committed in areas where civil armed forces are invited to aid civil power.
• Those involved in syndicated crime shall be relocated to other parts of the country for transparency and fair trial.
Special jails shall be designated to detain hardened criminals and the minimum quantum of punishments is now re-determined at ten years.
• The state will not allow Afghan immigrants or other foreign nationals to be used for terrorist purposes.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) on Tuesday announced it will challenge the recently passed Pakistan Protection Ordinance (PPO) in the Supreme Court, Express News reported.
The controversial ordinance was passed on April 7 in the National Assembly amid furore from the opposition against the bill, who termed it regressive and extra-constitutional.
The law grants sweeping powers of arrest and detention to security forces.
"This law will turn Pakistan into a police state," Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) vice chairperson told a news conference. "We have decided to take this law to court and challenge its anti-human rights stance."
Qureshi, a former foreign minister, said his party had the support of the Jamaat-e-Islami (JI) and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM).
The main opposition, the Pakistan People's Party, has led protests against the law in the National Assembly.
When the National Assembly approved the bill, opposition party members tore up copies and threw them in the air and walked out of the assembly in protest.
The law permits the security forces to shoot suspects on sight, detain them at secret locations for up to 90 days and carry out raids without search warrants. The security forces can also carry out secret trials.
Background
PPO – approved by President Mamnoon Hussain last year – is a decree that declares all peace-disrupting elements as ‘enemies of the state’, and states protection of life to be the state’s top priority.
Below are a few clauses from the ordinance:
• Every possible state instrument and resource will be deployed to defeat and frustrate all or any nefarious attempt to create disorder.
• The cancer of syndicated crime, in all its forms and manifestations, shall be responded by proportionate use of state force under the law.
• Joint investigation teams shall be constituted to conduct investigations by security agencies and police in all heinous crimes committed in areas where civil armed forces are invited to aid civil power.
• Those involved in syndicated crime shall be relocated to other parts of the country for transparency and fair trial.
Special jails shall be designated to detain hardened criminals and the minimum quantum of punishments is now re-determined at ten years.
• The state will not allow Afghan immigrants or other foreign nationals to be used for terrorist purposes.