Daily Times

The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday issued the detailed judgement in Advocate AK Dogar’s petition challenging the legal standing of the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) of 1999, and by extension, the conviction of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam Nawaz and son-in-law Capt (retd) Safdar under the ordinance.

The detailed judgement dismissed the suggestion that the NAO, passed by General (retd) Musharraf’s military junta, stood void following the 18th Amendment to the Constitution, and thus, the law could not be used to convict anyone.

In the 24-page judgement issued after the short order was released on September 1, the court said that the NAO had not been amended and would only have been considered void had an amendment been made to it. Earlier, during the hearing, the petitioner had rebutted the arguments of the federal government and the NAB, by stating that the impugned ordinance was promulgated under the Provisional Constitutional Order (PCO) of Musharraf’s military junta. He said the PCO was declared null and void after the 18th amendment. He said there would be no legal vacuum if the court annulled the NAO since the Eihtesab Act of 1997 would stand reinstated in its place.

Published in Daily Times, September 14^th 2018.