Muttahida Qaumi Movement of Pakistan (MQM-P) and Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) have challenged the new Election Bill, 2017 in the Sindh High Court (SHC) here on Monday. The Bill allows an ineligible person to be the head of a political party. Both the political parties, in their petition, requested the court to declare the bill as illegal and unconstitutional.
The submitted petition stated that the Election Bill, 2017 was in violation of the constitutional provisions and was specifically aimed at electing former prime minister Nawaz Sharif as the head of Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N) despite his lifelong disqualification by the Supreme Court in the Panama Papers.
Earlier, the Senate had passed the Election Bill, 2017 on September 22 with a majority vote, doing away with a clause which barred a person from serving as an office-bearer of a political party if he/she was either not qualified to be, or disqualified from being elected as a member of a parliament under Article 63 of the Constitution.
Leader of the opposition in the Senate Aitzaz Ahsan had proposed an amendment to the Bill, retaining the above-mentioned clause, but it was rejected by majority vote - 39 against 38. The opposition parties, whose combined strength is more than that of treasury benches, failed to pre-empt the bill without the amendment.
Taking great exception from not participating in the voting process, PTI had earlier issued show-cause notices to its senator Nauman Wazir and Kenneth Williams to explain as to why they stayed away from the voting, whereas MQM-P terminated a senator's membership for voting against party principles. Senator Mian Ateeq Shaikh had voted in favour of PML-N, rejecting the amendment.