The Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) on Friday fixed a date for the Arshad Sharif murder case, where the request for an independent probe into the killing would be heard.

Prominent journalist Sharif was shot in the head when Kenyan police opened fire on his car in October 2022. He had left Pakistan in August 2022 after multiple cases of sedition were registered against him in different cities.

The suo motu case was taken up by a six-member constitutional bench headed by Justice Aminuddin Khan in the Supreme Court. However, after the passage of the 27th Amendment and the formation of the FCC, it was granted jurisdiction over both constitutional and suo motu cases.

On Friday, the FCC cause list showed that a hearing had been scheduled for December 3, with the attorney general, the Islamabad inspector general of police (IG), and the foreign secretary among other respondents.

It will be heard by a two-member bench comprising Justices Aamir Farooq and Rozi Khan Barrech, regarding an “independent and transparent investigation into the murder of renowned journalist Arshad Sharif in Kenya”.

In August last year, former chief justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa explained that the Arshad Sharif murder case was not fixed before a five-judge larger bench as it did not require any constitutional interpretation.

In July 2024, the top court had referred the case back to the three-judge committee constituted under the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act, 2023 to re-fix it before a five-judge bench.