PESHAWAR: As the arrest of provincial minister for mineral development, Ziaullah Afridi by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Ehtesab Commission (KPEC) on charges of misuse of authority was challenged before the Peshawar High Court on Monday.

Also in the day, the commission arrested director (administration) of the department Mir Zaman in the case.

He will be produced before an ehtesab court today (Tuesday) for his physical custody.

Prior to the arrest of Ziaullah Afridi on July 9, the commission had held director general of the mineral development department Dr Liaquat Ali over illegal mining. He has been in custody since then.

Brother files petition insisting minister held over opposition to own govt’s wrong policies

A habeas corpus petition was filed by Ziaullah’s brother Hidayatullah Afridi in the high court.

He said his brother had performed duties as minister to the best of his abilities and that he got around 350 cases registered against the people involved in irregular and illegal mining.

Though Ziaullah had alleged after his arrest that he was implicated in a false case for ‘not facilitating the front men of the chief minister in illegal acts,’ the habeas corpus petition didn’t blame the arrest on the chief minister.

Only the petition maintained that the detainee had developed serious differences with high-ups, who had threatened him with dire consequences on the issue of mines and minerals in which blue-eyed people from their home districts were involved.

The petitioner said his brother’s arrest was meant to gain cheap popularity and misguide the public.

“In fact, the arrest of the detainee (minister) is the result of his opposition to wrong policies and acts of government,” he said.

The petition is filed through lawyers Abdul Lateef Afridi and Moazzam Butt.

The respondents in the petition are the KPEC director general, prosecutor general, director investigation and investigation officer, judge of the ehtesab court concerned and SHO of the relevant police station.

The petitioner said the KPEC Act 2014 was in conflict with the National Accountability Ordinance 1999 as the ordinance had been holding the field since 1999, while the Act was enforced in 2014 and therefore, in terms of Article 142 and 143 of the Constitution, the same was repugnant to the federal law, so it was an invalid law with all actions taken under it being illegal including the detention of the minister.

The petitioner said the National Accountability Bureau as federal agency had already initiated inquiry against the department of mines and minerals and had arrested four officials of the department including its former director general.

It added that the file pertaining to illegal mining of Mamakhel in Nowshera district was with NAB as well as the case of Phosphate was under its consideration, and the KPEC could not interfere in this matter as section 35 of the KPEC Act is clear as to which of the agency had to proceed with these cases.

The petitioner requested the court to direct that the detainee should be produced before the court so as to ascertain whether he had lawfully been detained by the respondents under a valid law, and in case his detention was found without lawful justification the respondents may be directed to release the detainee forthwith.

Published in Dawn, July 14th, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play