ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Wednesday issued notices to former prime minister Nawaz Sharif and his daughter Maryam Nawaz on a National Accountability Bureau (NAB) appeal against the suspension of sentences awarded to them as well as retired captain Mohammad Safdar by an accountability court.

A special bench of the SC, headed by Chief Justice Mian Saqib Nisar and comprising two other judges, wondered why NAB was pressing its appeal against retired Capt Safdar, too, when the trial court had sentenced him to jail just for a year. NAB’s prosecutor general Syed Asghar Haider said the bureau pressed the issue only to the extent of the observations given by the high court in its order that suspended his sentence along with the jail terms awarded to the Sharifs.

Nawaz Sharif, his daughter Maryam and son-in-law retired Capt Safdar were awarded 10 years, seven years and one year imprisonment, respectively, in the Avenfield apartment reference on July 6. The Islamabad High Court, however, suspended their sentences and gave a detailed judgement on the petitions filed by the Sharifs on Sept 19.

On Wednesday, the chief justice wondered if there was any precedent of a case related to the grant of bail or suspension of the sentence in which a 43-page judgement had been given.

“It takes only one or a half page to issue orders in such a situation,” Justice Nisar observed.

Adjourns hearing in Avenfield apartments case to Nov 6

The chief justice, however, said the parties had the right to go into a writ before the high court since they could not be debarred from their constitutional rights especially when ordinary laws under the criminal procedure code did not apply in matters relating to special courts like NAB (accountability) courts.

NAB’s special prosecutor Akram Qureshi referred to the 2014 verdict of the apex court in the Mohammad Arshad case and argued that suspension of sentence was granted only in cases of extreme hardships such as serious ailments, the treatment of which was not available in the prison or unnecessary delay in the hearing of appeals of convicts.

At this, the chief justice observed what NAB was trying to argue was that the high court committed a glaring error by not keeping in view the basic principles in the NAB law while dealing with the suspension of sentences awarded by the accountability court.

The counsel further argued that the high court usually did not go deep into appreciation of merits or admissibility of facts in such cases, but the IHC ‘virtually decided’ the fate of the main appeals against the conviction in the Avenfield corruption reference.

After a brief hearing, the SC adjourned further proceedings till Nov 6 and issued notices to Nawaz and Maryam.

In its appeal, NAB contended that the IHC failed to appreciate that it had seriously prejudiced the case of the prosecution by holding that the trial court judgement suffered from obvious and glaring defects and infirmities and that the convictions and sentences handed down to the accused might not sustain ultimately.

NAB argued that the conviction awarded to the Sharifs was based on cogent and tangible evidence, thus, the offence of corruption and corrupt practices stood proved.

Meanwhile, the same SC bench disposed of a case pertaining to airing of a false news item by some TV news channels about the recusal of Justice Umar Ata Bandial to be part of the bench hearing the NAB appeal.

The case was disposed of with a caution to be careful in future after Tayyab Baloch, president of the Press Association of the Supreme Court, Javed Soomro and Mian Aqeel Afzal representing different TV channels tendered unqualified apology.

The matter was taken up when the chief justice took serious notice of the false news and summoned all the CEO/owners of the channels that had aired the news item with a direction to appear before the court and clarify reasons for airing the news item.

At the hearing, Chief Justice Nisar observed that he suggested to Justice Bandial to go home and take rest as the latter was not feeling well. Yet Justice Bandial cleared the backlog before going home, he explained.

The chief justice referring to senior journalist Abdul Qayyum Siddiqui observed that being a senior reporter he should guide and train his fellow reporters. Mr Siddiqui conceded that stories should not be filed on mere assumptions and observed that the mistake could be the result of an error of judgement.

Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel regretted that such mistakes happened due to the cut-throat competition between the channels.

The court also ordered Pemra, which also had issued notices to the channels, not to take any action by dropping its notice after accepting the apology of the reporters who pleaded before the bench to ignore the mistake.

Pulished in Dawn, October 25th , 2018

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