Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa Tuesday said that the Supreme Court shouldn’t be blamed for everything as all issues would have been resolved if the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf had conducted its intra-party elections.
The CJP’s remarks came as a full court 13-member bench heard the Sunni Ittehad Council’s, an ally of the PTI, petition against the denial of reserved (women and minorities) seats.
The CJP-led bench includes Justices Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Munib Akhtar, Yahya Afridi, Aminuddin Khan, Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Ayesha Malik, Athar Minallah, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, Shahid Waheed, Irfan Saadat Khan and Naeem Akhtar Afghan.
During the hearing Tuesday, SIC’s lawyer Advocate Faisal Siddiqui argued that although the SIC didn’t contest the elections as a party, independent candidates did in fact participate in the polls.
The counsel further stressed that the SIC did submit the list of its candidates but the ECP rejected it, saying that the party didn’t contest the polls. CJP Isa highlighted that SIC had shown itself as a parliamentary political party on two occasions and a political party on one.
In response, Advocate Siddiqui contended that a political party can in fact be a parliamentary political party.
“The Constitution differentiates between a parliamentary political party and a political party,” the chief justice noted.
‘We were a political party before the February 8 elections and became a parliamentary political party after [winning] independent candidates joined us,” the SIC lawyer replied stressing that the Constitution doesn’t provisions the words “parliamentary party” other than Article 63A.
In response to the SIC lawyer’s argument that there wouldn’t have been any problem if the apex court had explained its verdict on the bat symbol, the chief justice said that the issue of reserved seats would simply not exist if the PTI had conducted its intra-party polls.
“Don’t blame everything on the SC,” he stressed.
“The PTI deprived its people of democratic rights […] had the elections been held they would’ve benefitted PTI members themselves.
“If you want to talk about democracy, then follow it to the letter,” the top judge remarked. “Start from the beginning, don’t talk about the ECP and the establishment,” he added.
