SCBA, LHCBA endorse opposition ToRs

ISAMABAD: The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and the Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA), while endorsing the opposition parties’ terms of reference (ToRs)  on the Panama Leaks, say they will decide about their future course of action if the government refuses to adopt these ToRs.

Supreme Court Bar Association President Syed Ali Zafar, while talking to The News, said they fully endorsed the ToRs proposed by the opposition parties to investigate the revelations made by the Panama Leaks.

“The opposition parties’ ToRs are based on the ToRs suggested by the SCBA. We formulated the ToRs how the judicial commission should work to probe the Panama Leaks, and we sent it to the opposition parties. The opposition parties adopted almost each point we presented in our ToRs, and they just slightly changed the language of these ToRs,” commented Ali Zafar.

He said they also endorsed the opposition parties’ demand of focusing the investigation only on the prime minister’s family and the names mentioned in the Panama Leaks.“There will be no accountability in the country if people holding the top-most public offices are not held accountable. Therefore, it is the need of the hour to investigate after the family of prime minister’s name was revealed in the Panama Leaks and it (commission) should focus only on the names mentioned in the Panama Leaks. The information shared in the Panama Leaks is very technical and it should be dealt with separately by a commission and no other corruption issues should be mixed with it as the ToRs proposed by the government are suggesting. For that purpose, there should be a separate commission,” commented Ali Zafar.

He said soon he will convene a meeting of all the high court bar associations and district bar associations and will decide the future course of action if the government did not adopt the ToRs proposed by the opposition parties.

When asked whether there would be any movement like the “lawyers’ movement for the restoration of judiciary” against the government if it refused to adopt the opposition parties’ ToRs for the constitution of the commission, he said he would not comment on this but the All Pakistan Lawyers Forum will decide about this which will be convened soon.

Rana Zia Abdul Rehman, the President of the Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA), while talking to The News, said they also fully endorsed the opposition parties’ stance on the Panama Leaks and that the commission should only focus on the Panama Leaks.

“The commission should focus only on the Panama Leaks as this is an important issue, and if the government refuses to adopt the opposition’s demands, then the LHCBA will decide about its future course of action,” commented Rehman.

When asked whether the LHCBA fully endorses the SCBA’s point of view on the Panama Leaks that the commission should focus on investigating only those whose names are mentioned in the Panama Leaks, he said they fully endorsed the SCBA’s point of view; however, any future action would be decided later.