ISLAMABAD: Two petitioners challenged the appointment of Najam Sethi as new Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman in the Islamabad High Court (IHC) here on Tuesday.

The petitioners, Abdullah Tahir from Islamabad and Ahmed Nawaz Khan from Dera Ghazi Khan, have challenged the federal government’s decision to appoint Sethi as PCB chairman and also the dissolution of the PCB’s governing board, citing these to be illegal and in violation of the PCB constitution.

Abdullah’s petition is fixed for hearing on Wednesday (today) before the court of Justice Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui while the petition of Ahmed Nawaz Khan will be heard before a bench on Thursday.

On Jan 15, an IHC division bench had restored Zaka Ashraf as PCB chairman. However, Federal Ministry of Inter-provincial Coordination (IPC) had challenged Zaka’s reinstatement but later it withdrew its appeal on Jan 31 after a two-member Supreme Court bench observed, “if the executive has the power to decide the future of PCB chairman, then it could do so without being prejudiced to IHC’s order regarding Ashraf’s reinstatement.”

Following the withdrawal of appeal, the federal government on Feb 10 removed Zaka as chairman besides dissolving the PCB’s governing board.

One of the petitioners, Abdullah, while nominating patron-in-chief (prime minister) through principal secretary, secretary establishment division, Sethi, Zaka and Shakeel Sheikh who is Islamabad Cricket Association (ICA) president as respondents, has prayed to the court to set aside Sethi’s appointment as PCB chairman.

The petitioner told the court that, unfortunately, in Pakistan cricket has been defamed due to inefficient people and mismanagement in the PCB.

The petitioner adopted that in order to clean up politics in cricket, the International Cricket Council (ICC) had taken a decision to amend the ICC constitution to provide for the important principle of free elections and the independence of member boards and to ban political appointments in cricket boards.

The reform would entitle the ICC to suspend a member country in the event of government interference in running of the national cricket board.

Petitioner Abdullah further contended that Sethi does not fulfil the pre-requisites for appointment as PCB chairman.

“He is a well-known political journalist and cannot do justice to the problems in cricket. He (Sethi) is absolutely unaware about the game. It is therefore, respectfully prayed that the appointment of Najam Sethi be declared as illegal under provisions of the PCB constitution,” said the petitioner.

Ahmed Nawaz has also prayed to the court to set aside the appointment of Sethi while noting that an IHC division bench reinstated Zaka as chairman PCB and the federal government then challenged the same before Supreme Court of Pakistan but later withdrew the appeal.

He added that after the reinstatement of Zaka as chairman PCB, the federal government was ill at ease and to ridicule the judgment, the patron-in-chief and IPC illegally and unlawfully issued a notification on Feb 10 for the suppression of the PCB and dissolved the governing board while removing PCB chairman Zaka.

The petitioner contended that the impugned notification from the govt is person specific and for the purpose of appointing Sethi as PCB chairman against the judgment and orders passed by this court.

He further said that the impugned notification issued by the federal government is without lawful authority as the IHC division bench had held that the president is patron-in-chief of the PCB and if the government is willing to change the patron-in-chief then a separate SRO notification must be issued but it never was.

“That the impugned notification is undemocratic and is akin to a martial law imposed by the federal government,” said petitioner Ahmed.