THOUGH the ECP has been formally admonished not once but twice for its continuing failure to obey the Supreme Court’s verdict in the reserved seats case, it has yet to take action. In its second clarification on the July 12 judgment, issued on Oct 18, the court made it abundantly clear that the amendment made by parliament to the Elections Act in August had no bearing on the judgment and had, therefore, warned the ECP that its implementation should not be delayed any further. And yet, the ECP continued to hang fire. Now, National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq, taking exception to the court’s judgment during a TV interview and describing it as a rewriting of the Constitution, has said he will take no action till the ECP makes its decision first. He further stated that if the ECP issues notifications for PTI candidates for reserved seats, “we will then see how to react to it”. It may be recalled that last month, before the Supreme Court’s second clarification, he wrote to the ECP, instructing it not to allocate the reserved seats to PTI after the changes made to the Elections Act.

While the former chief justice seemed to have little interest in seeing to it that his court’s judgment was implemented, a new chief justice has since taken charge — one who has promised to uphold the tripartite separation of powers and enforce the Supreme Court’s writ. Though Chief Justice Yahya Afridi differed from his brother judges on granting direct relief to the PTI and personally believed that the ECP must resolve the issue, it remains to be seen what he thinks about the fact that the majority’s decision in the reserved seats case was never implemented. It will be a test case for him, as the Supreme Court has been rendered technically defunct due to the government and ECP’s refusal to obey its directives. The matter will inevitably come up before him for deliberation if it has not already, and the coming days may see it brought up in court as well. In principle, the ECP does not have a leg to stand on and must stop delaying the matter further. It should allocate the reserved seats as directed and retreat from this controversy with grace. Its continued defiance will only serve to extend an unnecessary crisis.

Published in Dawn, October 29th, 2024