Daily Times

An appellate tribunal at the Rawalpindi bench of the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday issued the detailed judgement on former prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi’s eligibility to contest elections from NA-57 (Murree) constituency in the July 25 polls.

While the tribunal had ruled that Abbasi should not be allowed to contest elections because he was ‘not honest and sagacious’, the LHC suspended the verdict, enabling the former PM to contest elections.

In the detailed 10-page verdict, written by Justice Ibadur Rehman Lodhi, the tribunal found Abbasi guilty of concealment of facts for not providing details and description of his immovable property within Pakistan. The court observed that Abbasi had ‘exposed himself to the disqualification clause as provided in Articles 62 and 63 of The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973 and is not a qualified person to be elected or chosen as a Member of Majlis-e-Shoora (Parliament)’.

Further, the court said the appellants had noted a ‘marked difference in between the contents of two affidavits separately filed by the respondent/candidate along with two separate nomination papers i.e. one filed against Serial No.03 on 09.06.2018 and second filed against Serial No.12 on 11.06.2018 for constituency of NA-57 (Rawalpindi-I)’.

It said that in the Clause E in the affidavit, filed along with the nomination paper titled Serial No.03, Abbasi stated ‘none’, whereas the same clause in the papers titled Serial No.12 ‘was tampered with by first writing the words ‘None’ in the same manner as was mentioned in the earlier affidavit, but after interpolation, shares in Air Blue and Blue Pines Inn Murree were noted down against such column.

The verdict noted that the RO and Abbasi’s lawyer provided varying versions as to how and why the contradiction took place.

The verdict also noted that the cost of a house owned by Abbasi in Islamabad’s F-7/2 sector has been shown on Form B of the nomination papers to be Rs300,000, although, in that area even undeveloped land is worth around Rs5-6 million a marla.

Abbasi has mortgaged the same house to a bank against an amount of Rs24.7 million.

“Either the cost of such house has incorrectly been shown as Rs300,000, or, if it is the actual cost, then the respondent/candidate must have obtained the mortgaged money more than 80 times of the actual cost of mortgaged property from the Bank by using his influence of being a Member of Parliament or subsequent Prime Minister of Pakistan,” the verdict said. The verdict observed that the purpose of furnishing asset details at the time of nomination is to give a fair picture of a candidate to voters. However, in Abbasi’s case, it said the respondent/candidate had attempted to conceal facts.

The judgement declared Abbasi guilty of concealment of facts and withholding of the complete information from his voters.

On June 23, Justice Lodhi had suspended the Returning Officer for NA-57 (Murree), Haider Ali Khan, for accepting incomplete nomination forms submitted by Abbasi. In the detailed verdict, the court ruled that the RO’s suspension would continue and directed the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) to appoint a new RO for NA-57, where by-elections were to be held in October. Proceedings were also sought against Haider Ali Khan for alleged misconduct.

Published in Daily Times, September 15^th 2018.