PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Tuesday directed central leader of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf Azam Khan Swati to file an amended petition for holding Senate elections in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the light of the Constitution (Twenty-Six Amendment) Act.

A larger bench consisting of Chief Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim, Justice Syed Arshad Ali and Justice Wiqar Ahmad gave Mr Swati, a former senator, three days’ time to file his amended petition.

The bench was hearing a petition of Mr Swati for its orders to the ECP to hold the Senate elections in the province.

During the previous hearing, the bench had sought information from the ECP about when it intended to hold the said polls.

ECP insists bench cannot hear plea following 26th Constitutional Amendment

The ECP’s counsel, Mohsin Kamran Siddique, contended that after the passage of the Constitution (Twenty-Sixth Amendment) Act by the parliament, the bench lacked jurisdiction to hear the instant petition under Article 199 of the Constitution.

On March 28, the ECP declared in response to the applications of five women MPAs-elect that if the speaker of the provincial assembly fails to comply with the directions of the high court to administer oaths to the lawmakers elected to reserved seats, it [the commission] will be constrained to postpone the Senate election in the province until the administration of oaths to the applicants.

Advocate Ali Zaman appeared for the petitioner and said that the petition was filed on March 30 and the respondents had been delaying the matter.

When the bench inquired about the election schedule for the senate polls in KP, the ECP’s counsel said the matter was related to allocation of reserved seats, which had still been pending with the Supreme Court.

He contended that the petition had become time-barred as the ECP in its order of March 26 had declared that if oath was not administered to MPAs elected on reserved seats, then the polls, scheduled for April 2, would be postponed. He added that the said date of April 2 had already lapsed.

He pointed out that amendments had been made in Article 199 of the Constitution after which the jurisdiction of the bench had been restricted in certain matters and it could not now hear this petition.

Ali Zaman said that the ECP had postponed the April 2 Senate polls in the province and had linked it to the swearing in of opposition members, which the commission had declared elected to seats reserved for women and non-Muslims.

PETITION WITHDRAWN: The bench allowed Peshawar Bar Association vice-president Abdul Haseeb to withdraw his petition against the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Amendment Ordinance, 2024, and file an amended petition in his personal capacity.

The petitioner had requested the court to declare the amendments made to the law through the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Amendment Ordinance, 2024, unconstitutional and to stop the federal government from tabling any constitutional amendment bill.

An interesting situation emerged when additional attorney general Sanaullah Khan insisted that the PBA president claimed the association hadn’t filed the petition.

PBA president Amjad Marwat objected to the petition, arguing that the association had not permitted the vice-president to file the plea.

The bench observed that as the association had distanced itself from the present petition, therefore, it would be appropriate for the petitioner to file an amended petition in his personal capacity.

Meanwhile, former MNA Bushra Gohar also withdrew her petition wherein she requested to make the proposed constitutional Twenty-Sixth Amendments Bill (now Act) public for people’s consultation before its introduction in parliament.

The petitioner’s counsel, Ali Gohar Durrani, informed the bench that as the bill had already been passed, therefore, the petition had become infructuous.

“We may challenge the law in the Supreme Court after consultation,” he said.

Published in Dawn, October 23rd, 2024