Courting justice: NA Speaker to challenge tribunal’s verdict

Also ready to submit a contempt petition against the tribunal judge in LHC

LAHORE: Speaker National Assembly Sardar Ayaz Sadiq is ready to file a writ petition against the verdict of tribunal as well as a contempt petition against tribunal judge, Kazim Ali Malik, in Lahore High Court (LHC).

Addressing a press conference barrister Asjad Saeed, the counsel for the Speaker National Assembly Ayaz Sadiq, said that they will file a writ petition challenging the verdict of the tribunal and a contempt petition will also be filed against the tribunal judge who violated the judgment of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

He stated that it is clear judgment of the Supreme Court (SC) that the tribunal will decide first the maintainability of the petition which will be filed in election commission but in this case the maintainability of the petition was not decided and verdict was handed in first that is sheer violation of the SC’s judgment.



They demanded that the judge decide first the maintainability of the judgment but he remained adamant to decide it at the end of the case.

Barrister Asjad Saeed vowed that a writ petition will also be filed in LHC in which they will raise the point that the affidavit filed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) chief Imran Khan before the tribunal was not attested or signed by the oath commissioner.

Secondly, he further maintained, the evidences of six witnesses are also fake as the witnesses did not know whether they were on duty that day or not. Thirdly, Imran claimed that he was injured during the election days, and he was informed by his election agent Shoaib Siddiqui that the elections were rigged.

The Speaker’s counsel stated it is interesting enough that Shoaib was not produced before any tribunal so the statement of Imran that he was informed by Shoaib could not be entertained.

It is worth mentioning that a few days ago the election tribunal had issued a detailed verdict observing that around 10 policemen would be needed to provide 24-hour security to ensure the poll record was not tampered with before or during inspection.

The tribunal’s judgment comes after around a year-and-a-half of proceedings. The case, which was taken up on the PTI chairman’s plea, was inordinately delayed after PML-N MNA Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, who won the NA-122 seat, obtained a stay order from the LHC.

The LHC dismissed Sadiq’s plea on November 20, allowing the tribunal to finally proceed with the case.

Accepting Imran’s plea, the tribunal judge, Kazim Ali Malik, also constituted a one-man commission comprising former additional district and sessions judge Ghulam Hussain Awan to carry out the inspection.

The commission will submit an audit report to the tribunal after examining the NA-122 poll records. Awan has also been asked to look into the 54 ballot bags from PP-147 which went missing.

Among the various tasks it will carry out as part of the inspection, the commission will check the result provided by the RO against the number of polled votes inside the bags. The ballot papers will be verified against their respective counterfoils. The commission is likely to submit its report within the next two or three weeks.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2014.