Counsel seeks dismissal of reference against judge

The Presidential Reference against Justice Qazi Faez Isa is made on unconstitutional and illegal investigation for the collection of material; therefore, it must be dismissed on the admitted facts by the federal government.

Munir A Malik, who is representing Justice Faez, made this argument before the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

A 10-member Full Court, headed by Justice Umar Ata Bandial, heard identical petitions challenging the Presidential Reference against Justice Qazi Faez for allegedly not disclosing his foreign properties in wealth statements. Besides the apex court judge, Pakistan Bar Council, Supreme Court Bar Association, Bar Councils & Association of Punjab, Sindh and Balochistan and Abid Hassan Minto and IA Rehman have also challenged the Presidential Reference.

Munir A Malik submitted that a complaint filed by Waheed Dogar reached the Chairman Asset Recovery Unit (ARU) Shehzad Akbar instead of the Prime Minister, cabinet or the President. He took it to the then minister of law and justice Farogh Naseem and not to the Prime Minister or President.

He said the only document that Waheed Dogar filed with the complaint was about the apartment in London. According to him, the government has not submitted that document before the apex court.

The government contacted Barrister Ziaul Mustafa in the UK and asked him to start collecting the material about Justice Qazi Faez's properties in the UK. Munir Malik said after receiving the complaint, the chairman ARU wrote to the chairman FBR for details of the tax returns of the apex court judge. The ARU chief also asked the FIA to confirm the identity and passport details of Justice Qazi's wife from the NADRA database.

The counsel argued that after receiving the information from FIA, FBR, NADRA and Ziaul Mustafa, the ARU wrote a letter to the law minister in May. He said that after filing the reference, the private investigation firm was engaged to investigate Justice Qazi family members and the people residing in those properties.

Munir contended that the action in relation to the citizen is either taken under Constitution, rules and regulation made under the act or some enabling statutes. Justice Mansoor questioned whether it is not the prerogative or inherent power to the executive to proceed against citizen if there are some allegations against him.

The counsel argued if the chairman ARU exercised any power to collect evidence against Justice Qazi then the sanction of law was required. He can perform only those functions which are authorized under law. He said according to a Chaudhry Iftikhar judgment, the complaint should have landed on the President desk. He said authorization for the investigation should have come from the President.