Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar on Thursday rejected a plea filed by ousted prime minister Nawaz Sharif seeking to club all the three graft references filed against him by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and being heard by the accountability court.

Nawaz Sharif’s petition seeking to club the graft references was earlier rejected by the Supreme Court Registrar Office on the grounds that he did not approach the appropriate forum.

He then filed an appeal against the rejection of his plea by the registrar, contending that filing of three references separately was illegal, unconstitutional and also in violation of his fundamental rights guaranteed in the constitution.

The hearing of Sharif’s plea was held in the CJP’s chamber. Khawaja Haris Ahmad, counsel for Nawaz Sharif, requested that all the three references may be clubbed, as the charges levelled against his client were common in all the references. He argued that although the references pertained to different assets, the accused was the same.

He argued that the accountability court hearing the references separately was mandated to club the references, but it did not do so and turned down his request for clubbing the references. He stated that under the law, an accused could not be punished for the same crime for multiple times. After hearing the counsel, the CJP upheld the SC registrar’s decision.

Later, talking to the media, Khawaja Haris said that he did not expect such a decision, adding that such appeals were usually heard in the open court, whereas this plea was heard in the CJP’s chamber.

Published in Daily Times, November 17^th 2017.