LAHORE, June 8: While the Pakistan Cricket Board’s appellate tribunal, which is reviewing fast bowler Shoaib Akhtar’s application against the five-year ban imposed on him, has deferred its proceedings till June 14, its head retired Justice Aftab Farrukh has said that “bread and butter” is one of the main factors in this case.

While briefing media men after the fourth hearing of the case at the National Cricket Academy (NCA) on Sunday, the Justice said the next date might be the last hearing, provided Haseeb Ahsan, another member of the tribunal, who could not attend the meeting on Sunday due to bad health, would not need any further query from both the parties.

“If all goes well after the June 14 hearing, I may announce the decision in the next three to five days. But in order to do that, I have to spare time from the cases I am contesting as a lawyer in different courts since my bread and butter also depends on it,” he said.

On a question put before him that just like him being concerned about his bread and butter, a player’s bread and butter was also in being able to play and would the tribunal consider this factor in Shoaib’s case, the Justice said: “It is the main point to think about here.”

“It is for this very same ‘bread and butter’ factor that the tribunal has allowed Shoaib to go and play in the Indian Premier League (IPL) for which we have had to stop the proceedings for almost five weeks,” he said.

Asked reminded that Shoaib had already apologised to the PCB chairman Dr Nasim Ashraf along with the entire nation and both (the bowler and the chairman) had come to a truce in a defamation case, Justice Farrukh said that that was a separate issue.

“Yes, Shoaib had asked for an apology but the PCB chairman has only taken back the defamation case against the bowler. As far as this case is concerned, the PCB stands by his punishment of slapping a five-year ban on the bowler,” he said.

While commenting on Sunday’s hearing, Justice Farrukh said the new member of the tribunal, Naveed Chaudhary, had been briefed over case’s proceedings so far.

“As lawyers of both the parties have already wrapped up their arguments, the most time in Sunday’s hearing was spent on briefing Mr Naveed,” he said.

Naveed Chaudhary replaced Salman Taseer as the latter was elevated as Governor of Punjab.

Meanwhile Naveed informed that both the parties had been asked for a few more documents. However, he did not disclose the details.

To a question later on, Justice Farrukh told Dawn that as a professional he could not take any more pressure such as taking on the case in which another Pakistani bowler Mohammad Asif was involved.

“They are both are separate cases but there may be an impression that in case of punishment to both the players at one time, there will be a bad impression about the entire nation, but as a professional I have throughout my life gone after the merit,” he said.