“PTI has committed suicide in alliance with Sunni Ittihad”

June 25, 2024 2:50 am

Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faiz Isa on Monday questioned why independent candidates of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) allied with Sunni Ittihad Council (SIC) after February 8 elections.

SIC will not get reserved seats for women and minorities in national and provincial assemblies. SIC has appealed to the Supreme Court against the verdict of the Peshawar High Court (PHC). The Chief Justice made this comment during the hearing of that appeal.

Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Munib Akhtar, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Aminuddin Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Mohammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Ayesha A Malik, Justice Athar Minallah, Justice Syed Hassan Azhar Rizvi, Justice Shaheed Wahid, Justice Irfan Sadat Khan and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan.

The Chief Justice of Pakistan also said, why did independent candidates leave PTI despite having a political party? Why did you ‘suicide’ by joining a party that goes against your ideology?

CJP said, if independent candidates had stayed with PTI, there would not have been any problem today.

The hearing in this case has been adjourned till Tuesday.

Earlier in April, SIC chief Sahebzada Hamid Raza approached the Supreme Court after not being satisfied with the verdict of the Peshawar High Court to get seats for women and minorities.

On May 6, a three-member bench headed by Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, consisting of Justice Mohammad Ali Mazhar and Justice Athar Minallah suspended the Peshawar High Court verdict. Later the matter was referred to the Committee of Judges to constitute a larger bench as it required constitutional interpretation.

Meanwhile, in a report last week, the ECP told the apex court that the SIC was not eligible for the reserved seat as the party could not submit the list of candidates before the January 24 deadline.