Daily Times

KARACHI: The Sindh High Court (SHC) Saturday directed petitioners to further argue maintainability of a plea seeking disqualification of legislators who hold dual nationality and work permit (iqama) of other countries.

A division bench headed by Chief Justice Ahmed Ali M Shaikh was hearing a petition filed by Justice Helpline, a local non-governmental organisation that moved the SHC and requested it to direct the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to disqualify dual national politicians and those who hold or iqamas of other countries from holding public offices.

The court was also prayed to restrain those politicians from contesting elections in Pakistan.

The SHC bench questioned the maintainability of the petition when it came up for the hearing and put off the hearing to a date which would be announced later.

The court directed the petitioners-Atam Parkash Channani, Advocate Muhammad Nadeem Shaikh and Saleem Michael-to come up with comments on the maintainability of their petition by November 8.

Earlier, the office-bearers of Justice Helpline petitioned the high court and submitted that on July 28 2017, the apex court had passed a historical decision in the Panama Papers case against the then prime minister of Pakistan, and by virtue of that order Nawaz Sharif was disqualified from his office.

“There is a great apprehension that dual nationals may sell and sabotage country’s secrets or may just target to achieve their short-term goals in Pakistan and return back to their country of residence anytime. Dual nationals’ loyalty with Pakistan must be questioned? Therefore, the problem is not in Pakistanis dual nationality, it is the loophole in the system which permits them to do wrong things and get away,” Said Justice Helpline.

The petitioners maintained that first time in the history of the country, former auditor general of Pakistan was convicted for concealing his dual nationality and sentenced for one year on a complaint filed before the court.

Citing secretaries– interior, establishment, law, parliamentary affairs, Prime Minister’s Secretariat, Establishment, ECP and National Accountability Bureau (NAB) director general, Corporate Crime Circle of Federal Investigation Agency and Chief Economist (MPRG) State Bank of Pakistan as the respondents, petitioners had prayed to the court to disqualify all politicians who were holding dual nationality or iqama of other countries from taking part or contesting general elections.

Besides, the court was also requested to direct the respondents to make and implicate strict laws for purchasing foreign exchange from open market and transferring/ smuggle the same to other countries illegally and unlawfully and launch an inquiry into the matter within stipulated time and submit their respective inquiry reports before the court.

Published in Daily Times, October 29^th 2017.