LAHORE: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday completed consultation with the legal brains of the government and agreed to ask two apex court judges to recuse themselves from hearing the cases against the PML-N leadership.

“The meeting has decided that the PML-N would first ask the two judges of the Supreme Court to recuse themselves from the cases involving its leadership before going ahead for any legal remedy against them,” a federal cabinet member told Dawn after the meeting.

He said it was a legal tradition that a ‘controversial’ judge recused himself from the bench on the request of an aggrieved party.

“The PML-N will formally ask the judges in question to recuse themselves from the cases related to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and other party leaders,” he said and added that one of them remained a monitoring judge in the cases against the elder Sharif who has been living in the United Kingdom since November 2019 on ‘medical grounds.’

The legal team briefed the premier about the “biased attitude” of the two judges towards the party of the Sharifs, citing different cases including Panama and Ramzan Sugar Mills, Pakpattan Land Allotment (against the Sharifs family members).

Insider says ‘bold move’ may pave way for Nawaz Sharif’s return from exile

A purported audio leak related to one of the judges also came under discussion.

“The meeting also decided that it would not retract from its demand in this respect,” he said.

A party insider told Dawn that the “bold move” would pay off in case both the judges in question recuse themselves of the cases against the PML-N leaders especially Nawaz Sharif which might pave the way for his return from London.

“Nawaz Sharif wants relief in the Al-Azizia corruption case (in which he was serving a seven-year imprisonment) before returning to his homeland,” the insider said.

Defence Minister Khwaja Asif told a private channel that the PML-N direly needed Nawaz Sharif back home to lead the party to match with Imran Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI).

The PML-N leadership has already started taking on the apex court judges in public rallies and press conferences.

PML-N chief organiser Maryam Nawaz recently asked for accountability in the judiciary and said “Pakistan needed honest judges instead of the ones who allegedly favoured Imran Khan.”

She said the judges named in the purported audio leak should have moral courage to resign from their post. “Imran Khan is looking to get support from the judiciary to come back to power after failing to get support from the establishment,” Ms Nawaz said.

On the other hand, ousted prime minister Imran Khan urged the superior judiciary to save society from the “scourge of blackmailing and violation of fundamental rights of privacy and dignity of people from those involved in tapping phones and making deep-fake videos to blackmail opponents.

“The actors involved in phone tapping and making deep-fake videos need to be exposed, as they are violating the Fair Trial Act as well as the Official Secrets Act,” Mr Khan asserted.

Published in Dawn, February 22th, 2023