Staff Report
ISLAMABAD: PML-N Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Tuesday filed a new application, along with “extremely relevant, simple and clear-cut facts”, with the Islamabad High Court (IHC) seeking annulment of the verdict in the Avenfield Apartment reference.
Accountability Court judge Mohammad Bashir had on July 6, 2018, 19 days before the general elections, convicted former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam Nawaz and her husband retired Captain Mohammad Safdar in the Avenfield Apartment reference and handed them jail terms of 10, seven and one years, respectively, for owning assets beyond known sources of income.
They had filed appeals in the IHC against the conviction. The court had on Sep 18 the same year suspended their sentences and released them on bail. NAB is now seeking expeditious disposal of the appeals in 30 days.
Maryam’s latest application has been filed “in consequence of certain extremely relevant, simple and clear-cut facts which have come to light after the pronouncement of judgement and sentence” in the case, according to a copy of the petition.
“These facts which even otherwise are quite well-known are being brought to the notice of this honourable court for enabling it to decide this matter expeditiously, justly, fairly and in accordance with law,” the miscellaneous application filed through Advocate Irfan Qadir said. The IHC registrar office, meanwhile, raised two objections to Maryam’s new application.
According to the registrar, Maryam has made the same plea in her application as she did in her primary appeal challenging her conviction in the Avenfield case. The office further said “Maryam Nawaz can adopt fresh grounds in the appeal only with the court’s permission.”
The objections will be taken up by an IHC special bench along with Maryam’s application on Wednesday (today). The court will also decide whether to club the new application with Maryam’s original appeal or hear it separately.
In her application, Maryam stated that the entire proceedings that resulted in her conviction were a “classic example of outright violations of law and political engineering hitherto unheard of in the history of Pakistan”.
She also attached a reference to the speech made by former IHC judge Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui at the District Bar Association, Rawalpindi on July 21, 2018, wherein he had claimed that the country’s top intelligence agency was involved in manipulating judicial proceedings.
“The ISI officials had approached the chief justice asking him to make sure Nawaz and his daughter should not be bailed before the elections,” reads the petition, quoting an excerpt from ex-judge Siddiqui’s speech.
In a tweet later, Maryam said the media “for reasons known to everyone” had not highlighted the core subject of her petition submitted to the IHC. “The summary of which is that the case/verdict against me was pre-planned, orchestrated and influenced by Gen Faiz Hameed, the then DG counter-intelligence,” she wrote, referring to the current Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) chief.
She said the same had been “revealed” by Justice Siddiqui, “who has exposed the manner in which law, principles of justice & fair-play were not only violated but made a mockery of, making this case a classic example of how political victimisation in Pakistan is carried out at the cost of judiciary, constitution & law”.
The manner in which the case unfolded “also makes evident how individuals [such] as Gen Faiz Hameed not only violate the sanctity of their oath but also in doing that bring a bad name to the revered institution of The Armed Forces that resultantly has to bear the brunt of personal ambitions”, the PML-N leader alleged. Earlier in June this year, Siddiqui’s lawyer had read out his statement in the Supreme Court during the hearing of his appeal against the opinion of the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) as well as the Oct 11, 2018, notification under which he was removed as a judge of the high court for a speech he made on July 21 that year.
His counsel had said that during his visit on July 19, 2018, incumbent ISI Director-General, who was then DG counter-intelligence, Lt Gen Faiz Hameed, told Siddiqui that after his June 2018 verdict, he was summoned by the army chief who showed great annoyance and displeasure. In June 2018, Justice Siddiqui of the IHC had directed the ISI to remove encroachments from a portion of Khayaban-i-Suharwardi in front of the headquarters of the spy agency in Islamabad.
In his statement to the SC during the hearing of the case on June 9, 2021, Siddiqui had claimed that when he asked how they managed the constitution of a bench to hear the appeal against the conviction of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, Gen Hameed told him that the then IHC chief justice, Anwar Khan Kasi, was approached in Quetta through a common friend, where he was asked to constitute a division bench which was not headed by Justice Siddiqui.
Justice Kasi, according to Siddiqui, told Gen Hameed he “will constitute a bench about which we are comfortable”. Gen Hameed had further said that they wanted an assurance that the bail plea of accused Nawaz Sharif was not taken up before the 2018 general election, Siddiqui’s counsel said, adding that they wanted that later, the matter be brought before a bench headed by Justice Siddiqui to attach some credence.
