We can exert more pressure if decisions are to be made this way: Sana

Says SC should not have heard Panama case

LAHORE: Punjab Law Minister Rana Sanaullah has said that the PML-N leaders are anxious to speak out. “If verdicts are to be made under pressure, then we can create an environment of more pressure (to get a favourable verdict).”

Talking to reporters in front of the Punjab Assembly here on Monday, the law minister said that the Supreme Court should not have even admitted the Panama petition for hearing, as the case has no legal or humanitarian grounds.

It is a political case which would not be settled before the 2018 elections, he added. Rana Sanaullah said that in his opinion there existed strong legal grounds for not admitting the petition; however, the PML-N honoured the court decision.

He expressed his discomfort over the dissenting notes by two Supreme Court bench judges, saying that it would have been better had the honourable judges chosen to quote a verse from the Holy Quran or a Hadith to start the verdict, instead of quoting a line from the novel of an Italian American author.

Referring to the quote “Behind every great fortune, there is a crime”, the minister said if there’s any crime behind a political worker becoming the prime minister, then there would be a crime behind every AC (assistant commissioner) becoming the chief secretary, every ASP becoming the IG (inspector general of police) and every lawyer becoming a judge.

He said that Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf chairman should learn to accept the court decisions and should stop his hypocrisy of announcing that he accepts the decision while at the same time terming the decision somehow compromised. He said Nawaz Sharif has been cleared of the charges levelled against him by the opposition parties and it is time now for the PTI chief to come clean about the questions raised about him regarding corruption and ineligibility.

Rana Sanaullah said Asif Ali Zardari needs to learn the basics of judicial decisions. The way Asif Zardari and Imran Khan were using the two dissenting notes of the judges for propaganda while disregarding the majority decision of the court, they should be charged with contempt of court.

He said the people had rejected the PTI and the PPP in elections and now the courts have rejected their efforts to malign the PML-N. Commenting on the Supreme Court’s remarks about Imran Khan that he should use his stature and leadership position to do good, he said the honourable court does not know the monstrous ego of Imran Khan. Imran Khan does not know expressions of decency and calling Imran Khan a leader by a judge would only feed his ego and this would be akin to letting loose a bull in a China shop. He said on one side of Imran Khan is a Satan and on the other side is cunning mullah.