LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Tuesday dismissed writ petitions of Jamshed Cheema, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf’s candidate for NA-133 by-poll, and his wife, who was a covering candidate, against the rejection of their nomination papers.

A two-member bench, comprising Justice Jawad Hassan and Justice Muzammil Akhtar Shabbir, dismissed the petitions after hearing arguments of the lawyers for the PTI and the PML-N.

The returning officer had rejected nomination papers of the petitioners, a decision that was upheld by an election appellate tribunal.

The PML-N’s voters challenged the nomination papers of the PTI’s candidates, saying the proposer, Bilal Hussain, was not qualified to propose the nominations under the Elections Act of 2017.

During the hearing, the bench warned the petitioners against giving an impression that there had been a delay on the part of courts.

PTI candidates’ counsel says it’s the ECP’s fault that the proposer is not on the voters list

Cheemas’ counsel Mobeenuddin Qazi argued that the returning officer rejected the nomination papers on the basis that their proposer was not a registered voter in the NA-133 constituency. He said the impugned orders passed by the election tribunal and the returning officer were in violation of Article 4 of the Constitution, which was a citadel of administrative and judicial governance in the country.

He said the proposer had duly obtained a voter certificate from the Election Commission of Pakistan before proposing the candidature of the petitioners. He pointed out that the voter certificate did not show the constituency of a voter.

The petitioners came to know through the media that their proposer was not a registered voter of the constituency, the counsel argued. The petitioners sought permission to change the proposer, but their request was dismissed by the returning officer.

The counsel said it was the ECP’s fault that the proposer was not on the voter list as all his family members were voters in NA-133. He said the Election Commission had registered more than 3,000 fresh voters in the constituency.

He argued that the petitioners had been illegally disenfranchised and deprived of their constitutional right to contest the election.

On the other hand, the lawyers of the ECP and PML-N’s voters argued that the petitions were not maintainable.

Through a short order, the bench dismissed the petitions.

Earlier, two division benches of the Lahore High Court recused themselves from the petitions of the PTI candidates for personal reasons.

Lahore’s NA-133 constituency fell vacant after the death of PML-N’s MNA Pervaiz Malik.

The ECP announced a by-poll in the constituency on Dec 5. Meanwhile, the PML-N announced that the late MNA’s widow, Shaista Pervaiz Malik, would be its candidate for the election.

Published in Dawn, November 17th, 2021