LAHORE: Rasheed A Rizvi has been elected as president of the Supreme Court Bar Association for the year 2016-17. Mr Rizvi of Professional group, led by Pakistan Tehrek-e-Insaf leader Hamid Khan notched the top slot of president with 1,289 votes and his rival of Independent group Farooq H Nike, a former Senate chairman and ex-law minister attained 1,060 votes.
Mr Rizvi had been president of Sindh High Court Bar Association four times and a sitting member of the Pakistan Bar Council. He is a former judge of the Sindh High Court and was sacked for not taking oath under the 2000 PCO promulgated by former president Gen (retired) Pervez Musharraf. Mr Rizvi had the support of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf, Jamat-i-Islami and a small number of PML-N’s lawyers’ faction. Lawyers’ wings of PPP, PML-Q, ANP and JUI-F backed Mr Naek. A majority of PML-N lawyers also supported him. Professional group won the top slot of SCBA president after six years. It had lost every year since victory of Independent group leader Asma Jahangir in the election in 2010-11. Aftab Ahmad Bajwa of the Professional group also notched the slot of secretary. He obtained 1,060 votes against Safdar Hussain Tarar of Independent group, who bagged 945 votes.