KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) on Thursday once again issued a notice to Federal Minister for Water Resources Faisal Vawda on a petition seeking his disqualification.

A law officer of the Election Commission of Pakistan informed the two-judge bench headed by Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar that an identical petition against the federal minister was also pending before the ECP, which is scheduled to be heard on Tuesday, March 10.

The bench was also informed that no representative had shown up on behalf of Mr Vawda despite being put on notice at the last hearing, following which the bench once again issued a notice to the federal minister and adjourned the matter with an observation to let the ECP hear the petition pending before it at the upcoming hearing.

Advocate Qadir Khan Mandokhail, who contested the 2018 general election on a PPP ticket from NA-249 Karachi against Mr Vawda, filed a petition before the SHC in which he contended that the minister was a dual holder of both Pakistani and American nationality when he filed his nomination papers on June 7, 2018 but had failed to disclose this fact in his nomination papers.

He further maintained that the federal minister had moved an application on June 22, 2018 to withdraw his American nationality and that three days later the US consulate accepted this request.

The petitioner submitted that he had also approached the returning officer against Mr Vawda, but that his application was not entertained.

He argued that concealing one’s dual nationality was the violation of Article 62 and Article 63 of the Constitution, and pleaded for the federal minister’s disqualification on this basis.

Published in Dawn, March 6th, 2020