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Thursday March 28, 2024

SC halts notification of four elected senators

By Sohail Khan
March 06, 2018

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court (SC) on Monday halted the notification of four candidates elected to Senate in Saturday’s election, for allegedly holding dual citizenship and sought their details from the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

A three-member bench of the apex court, headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar, heard a case relating to dual citizenship of judges and civil servants. The chief justice observed that persons with dual citizenship could not become members of parliament.

The court directed the ECP to halt the notification of Chaudhry Muhammad Sarwar of the PTI and Haroon Akhtar, Nuzhat Sadiq and Saadia Abbasi of the PML-N, elected to the Senate, and issued them notices.

The court also constituted a six-member committee headed by the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) director general on the proposal of the Attorney General for scrutinising the dual citizenship of bureaucrats. The committee will comprise the Nadra chairman, Immigration and Passports director general, Interior Ministry additional secretary, Establishmentand FBR member.

During the hearing, the chief justice noted that he came to know that some six persons with dual nationality had been elected to Senate. The Attorney General told the court that Chaudhry Sarwar, Haroon Akhtar, Nuzhat Sadiq and Sadia Abbasi were possessing dual citizenship. The court directed the ECP secretary to halt the notification of these senators till apex court decision.

The chief justice asked the Nadra chairman what he could do about these individuals who did not disclose their dual citizenship and, when the Authority would give its briefing over the provision of facility to overseas Pakistanis for casting their votes in the forthcoming general elections.

The court observed that no more time would be granted to Nadra in this regard as it would have to give right to the overseas Pakistanis to cast their votes at any cost. The court asked about the number of people in Nadra having dual citizenship on which the chairman said that he had given a deadline until March 8 to Nadra officials to give their declaration on the matter and after receiving, it would be submitted in the court. The chief justice said that not a single judge of the Supreme Court was having dual citizenship.

Earlier, the Establishment Division secretary submitted a report wherein it was stated that the number of civil servants holding dual nationality is 64 in Punjab, five in Sindh, 18 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, eight in Balochistan, 28 in Azad Kashmir and one in Gilgit-Baltistan. The chief justice observed that any civil servant found guilty of hiding information about dual citizenship would be removed from his position. He noted that former SSP Malir Rao Anwar had an Iqama but it was not known whether Iqama falls under dual citizenship or not.

The chief justice sought details pertaining to the officers in the Prime Minister Secretariat having dual citizenship. He also summoned Secretary to Prime Minister Fawad Hassan Fawad for not providing information by 43 divisions and also summoned secretaries of different ministries.

The chief justice asked the authorities to provide details and information regarding CNIC numbers of all the officers to Nadra, which will then trace it through CNICs.

The court directed the six-member committee to submit a report about the dual citizenship of officers within two weeks, while Nadra was directed to prepare a software for scrutinising the dual nationality of the officers. The court held that the said software for collecting the data will be provided to the heads of the institutions and secretariats and adjourned further hearing until March 26.