ISLAMABAD: Awami Muslim League chief Sheikh Rashid Ahmed on Wednesday filed a petition against the Elections Act, 2017 — which allows a disqualified parliamentarian to hold any party office — in the Supreme Court, seeking its annulment as well as a declaration that the re-election of Nawaz Sharif as PML-N president is unconstitutional, unlawful and of no legal effect.

On Tuesday, a local lawyer, Zulfikar Ahmed Bhutta, had moved a similar petition before the apex court.

The petition filed by Sheikh Rashid through senior counsel Dr Farogh Naseem also sought a restraining order against Mr Sharif from acting as an office-bearer or a party head by suspending his election till the time the petition is pending before the court.

The petition argues that the amendment to the law is mala fide and unconstitutional as it is being introduced only to accommodate one person i.e. Nawaz Sharif who has been disqualified by the Supreme Court under Article 62(1)(f) of the Constitution.

According to the petition, the people at large who are citizens of Pakistan have a right to join any political party, including the PML-N, but this right would be completely jeopardised if the party is headed by a disqualified person.

The petitioner and the people at large derive a fundamental vested right that no one, who is disqualified under the Constitution by a court of law, should control parliamentarians in the National Assembly, Senate and provincial assemblies of Pakistan, the petition said.

Therefore, any interpretation that despite a declaration by a court that Mr Sharif is disqualified to be a parliamentarian, the latter can still become the party head of the PML-N, would at least violate the fundamental rights of “freedom of association” entrenched in Article 17, so also the fundamental right of life found under Articles 9, 10-A and 14 of the Constitution.

Even otherwise, the act to make Mr Sharif as the PML-N head is against Articles 62, 63 and 189 of the Constitution, and unless and until this court extends immediate judicial interference, grave prejudice will be caused to the petitioner and the public at large, the petition argues.

PPP decision

The Pakistan Peoples Party has decided to challenge in the Supreme Court Clause 203 of the Elections Act, 2017. The decision was taken at a meeting of the party held at Zardari House in Islamabad on Wednesday evening.

The meeting presided over by former president Asif Ali Zardari was attended by Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Syed Khursheed Shah, former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf, Latif Khosa, Nayyer Bukhari, Rehman Malik, Naveed Qamar, Senator Aitzaz Ahsan, Sherry Reh­man, Saleem Mandviwalla, Manzoor Chaudhry, Tanvir Kaira and Farhatulah Babar.

Mr Babar said that the meeting also decided that Sardar Latif Khosa would be the counsel for the party in the case.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2017