Blaze News - Pakistan

The Supreme Court will inaugurate its new judicial year today (Monday) just five days before retirement of incumbent Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Umar Ata Bandial. All available judges of the apex court, senior lawyers, attorney-general for Pakistan (AGP), and leaders of the Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) and the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) will attend a ceremony to be held in the Supreme Court’s Courtroom No 1. CJP Bandial, AGP Mansoor Awan, the PBC vice chairman and the SCBA president will also address the ceremony. At the start of a judicial year, the CJP reviews the previous year's performance and sets priorities for the next year but the incumbent CJP is retiring this week. It will be interesting as to what CJP Bandial will say in his speech at the event as the Supreme Court has faced several controversies since September last year. Firstly, the divisions among judges seem to have deepened in the past one year. Due to these internal divisions, the authority of the top ...

Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) has contended that National Accountability Ordinance (NAO), 1999—the law that governs the country’s top anti-graft watchdog, the National Accountability Bureau (NAB)—is not applicable to the superior courts judges and armed forces personnel. "As the Constitution of Pakistan provides for a comprehensive mechanism regarding the accountability of the superior judiciary; hence inclusion of the superior judiciary within the purview of the definition of “public officeholder” under the NAB amendments would be irrational," said a concise statement. AGP Mansoor Awan submitted this concise statement to the Supreme Court in connection with a case regarding amendments to the NAO, 1999 introduced by the last PML-N led coalition government. The statement said under Article 209 of the Constitution, the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) is mandated with the duty of regulating cases of misconduct and discipline pertaining to the superior judiciary. "The S...