President can announce poll date, says CJP Bandial

ISLAMABAD: According to Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, the Elections Act of 2017 was expressly written by the parliament to allow the president to announce the election date.

President Arif Alvi announced earlier this month that elections would take place in April after concluding that the governors of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa KP and Punjab, Haji Ghulam Ali and Baligh Ur Rehman, and the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) were not carrying out their constitutional obligations to announce the date for polls in both provinces. This announcement was met with harsh criticism from the government. After Justices Ijaz Ul Ahsan, Justice Sayyed Mazahar Ali Akbar Naqvi, Justice Athar Minallah, and Justice Yahya Afridi withdrew from hearing the case, the bench was reconstituted.

The case’s hearing was supposed to begin today at 11am, but it was postponed, according to reports, because of the bench’s formation in response to a Supreme Court order from the hearing on February 23. A written order was issued on the SC’s website in which dissenting notes of Justice Afridi, Justice Minallah, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail and Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah had been included. Following this, a five-member bench presided over today’s hearing. It was led by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial and included Justices Munib Akhtar, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Shah, and Mandokhail.

The newly-formed bench — after the counsel of speakers from both provinces, Barrister Ali Zafar concluded his arguments — adjourned the hearing of the case till 9:30am tomorrow.