Athar Minallah rejects plea seeking SC consultation over appointment of NAB chief

Athar Minallah rejects plea seeking SC consultation over appointment of NAB chief

Obaid Abrar Khan
June 7, 2022

Athar Minallah rejects plea seeking SC consultation over appointment of NAB chief

Chief Justice Islamabad High Court Justice Athar Minallah heard the petition against the appointment of the NAB chief.
The court declared the plea non-maintainable.
It remarked that the court cannot give directions to the parliament.

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Tuesday made a plea seeking inclusion of Chief Justice of Pakistan Umar Ata Bandial in the consultation process for appointment of the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) chairperson.

Chief Justice Islamabad High Court Justice Athar Minallah heard the petition against the appointment of the NAB chief.

The court declared the plea non-maintainable and remarked that the court cannot give directions to the parliament.

Justice Minallah wondered that “How can a court dictate the appointment of the NAB chairman?”. It was the prerogative of the parliament and not the courts, he remarked.

The petitioner maintained that the Supreme Court had ordered that amendments should be made in Section 6 of the NAB Ordinance and the CJP should be consulted on the appointment.

The IHC chief justice remarked that the judgement that the petitioner was referring to was only an observation, not a verdict. Many judgments had been made since then, he added. “The appointment of the NAB chairman is the prerogative of the parliament,” he reiterated.

“The amendment in the Section 6 for NAB chairman’s appointment couldn’t be made even after 20 years therefore the Ministry of Law should be directed to make amendments to the method of appointing a NAB chairman and appointment should be restricted without consultation with the top judge,” the petitioner maintained in the plea.

The National Accountability (Second Amendment) Bill, 2021 was passed by the National Assembly on May 26 to amend the NAB Ordinance. With the amendments, the government took away the bureau’s 90-day detention power and the authority to probe decisions taken by federal and provincial cabinets.

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