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LAHORE, June 14: The Lahore High Court on Monday dismissed a petition of the Pakistan Lawyers Forum against the deportation of PML-N president Mian Shahbaz Sharif.
Upholding the registrar's office objection, the court said the PLF had no locus standi to raise any issues concerning Shahbaz Sharif. The petition, filed on May 31 through Advocate A.K.Dogar, sought a court injunction against the federal government that the deportation of Shahbaz Sharif on May 11 was unconstitutional, unlawful and was interference with the liberty of a citizen of Pakistan.
On the objection, the PLF refiled the petition with the remarks that the court and not its office had powers to raise the objection which amounted to passing a judicial order.
The petitioner wrote to the office that the plea be fixed before a court to adjudicate if the PLF had a locus standi in the matter. The issue was referred to Chief Justice Iftikhar Husain Chaudhry who appointed a bench to hear the plea as an objection petition.
The petitioner, in addition to raising constitutional issues, cited the Supreme Court decision of May 8 that Shahbaz Sharif had a constitutional right to return and live in Pakistan and that the government had not produced any agreement under which he was forced to live in exile.
The petitioner submitted that the government had committed an act contemptuous of the apex court's decision. He submitted that Shahbaz Sharif was physically overpowered and thrown into another plane and the act amounted to abduction under sections 362 and 365 of the Pakistan Penal Code.
Another point raised in the petition was that by deporting Shahbaz Sharif, the government had deprived him of facing trial in a criminal case which denied him the right of access to justice.
HAMZA CASE: The Lahore High Court on Monday adjourned till the end of this month the hearing of a writ petition of Hamza Shahbaz, the son of former Punjab chief minister Shahbaz Sharif, in which he challenged a recent decision of the interior secretary who did not allow him a one-time permission to leave for Saudi Arabia.
The fresh petition will be heard along with his earlier writ petition through which he contested the inclusion of his name to the exit control list and prayed for removing him from the ECL.
