KARACHI, June 10: The tribunal hearing a petition in respect of the NA-255 poll in October 2002 on Tuesday fixed June 16 as the final date for its hearing.

A defeated candidate in the poll, MMA’s Aslam Mujahid, had challenged the election of Mehmood A. Qureshi of the MQM (H) from the constituency.

The election petition was pending before the tribunal, comprising Justice Moosa K. Leghari of the Sindh High Court, when Mr Qureshi died of heart attack in April this year. The Election Commission called upon the National Assembly constituency to elect a new representative and announced the byelection programme, with the balloting scheduled for June 23.

Mr Mujahid moved the SHC against the byelection announcement and contended that he had sought to be declared elected from NA- 255 in his election petition.

His plea should be decided before declaring the seat vacant due to the death of the sitting MNA. A division bench, which consisted of Justices Sabihuddin Ahmed and S. Ali Aslam Jafri, declined to stay the by-poll but directed that the election petition be disposed of by June 23.

As the petition came up before the tribunal on Tuesday, Additional Advocate General Qazi Khalid Ali submitted that the Sindh advocate-general or the Election Commission of Pakistan was not on notice in the writ petition resulting in the division bench direction.

He said the tribunal had been constituted by the Election Commission under the Representative of People Act, 1976. The by-election and its schedule had also been announced by the Election Commission under the same Act and the tribunal could not set them aside. Since no law officer was heard in the writ petition, he did not even have its copy or a copy of the direction given by the division bench.

Justice Leghari observed that he was bound by the division bench’s direction and would dispose of the petition before June 23. He asked the petitioner’s counsel, Junaid Farooqui, to furnish copies of the election and writ petitions to Mr Khalid Ali and fixed June 16 for final arguments.

Earlier, Mr Farooqui maintained that his client, petitioner Aslam Mujahid, should have replaced Mr Qureshi on his death being the runner-up in the October 2002 poll. No byelection could be held pending the disposal of his election petition, which might be allowed.

Meanwhile, Justice Leghari fixed June 17 for further hearing of a petition filed by MQM’s Nasreen Jalil against the election of MMA’s Abdus Sattar Afghani from another Karachi constituency, NA- 250. She recorded her testimony on Tuesday and would be cross- examined on June 17.