Parliamentary body on audio leaks meets today

ISLAMABAD: A meeting of special parliamentary committee on audio leaks, while ignoring the Islamabad High Court (IHC) restraining orders of Wednesday, would be held on Thursday (today) in the Parliament House’s committee room 5.

The committee, headed by leader of the Independents in the National Assembly Muhammad Aslam Bhutani, who has also served as speaker of the Balochistan Assembly, would chair it. Former chief justice of Pakistan (CJP) Mian Saqib Nisar’s son Najam Saqib, and two others have to appear before it in compliance of the orders already served on them.

The committee reserves the right to issue warrants of the summoned if they fail to appear. Senior officials from the FIA and other relevant agencies would be in attendance at today’s meeting. The meeting would be open for the media as the previous one was held in-camera.

The committee had summoned for its today’s meeting Mian Saqib Nisar’s son Najam Saqib and two politicians -- Mian Aziz and Abuzar Chadhar -- in connection with its probe into the leaked audios. A couple of audio clips allegedly featuring the voice of Najam Saqib went viral last month. In one of the clips, Najam could be heard telling Chadhar that his father, former chief justice Saqib Nisar, had “worked really hard” to get Chadhar a Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) ticket.

In the second audio, Najam allegedly tells Mian Aziz how much money he expected in return for the party ticket. The National Assembly took notice of the audio clips on May 2 and later formed a special committee to investigate the matter. When the special committee met early this month, the members agreed to hold the proceedings in-camera in view of the sensitivity of matters under consideration. Aslam Bhutani told this scribe that he had not received any court orders and the next course of action of the special committee would be determined in the meeting on Thursday. He said that no court could interfere in the proceedings of the parliament. Of all the people, former CJP should be aware of it.

Sources said that the parliamentary committee could formally order for forensic audit of the recently leaked audios and the FIA could be entrusted the assignment. Bhutani said the parliament respects all institutions, and it hopes that they would also give respect to the parliament as the mother of the institutions.