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ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan has overruled its registrar office’s objections to an application of former president Asif Ali Zardari to transfer corruption cases in accountability courts of Islamabad to similar courts in Karachi.
A three-judge bench led by Justice Umar Ata Bandial noted that the points raised by Zardari’s counsel Farooq H Naek in his application require “judicial application of mind”.
“Therefore, the objections raised by the registrar ought to be decided by the court. Accordingly, the said objections are overruled. These miscellaneous appeals are accordingly allowed,” said the order authored by Justice Bandial.
The hearing on the registrar office’s objections was conducted on December 15. However, the matter is yet to be placed before a bench for regular hearing.
The order said it appeared that the remedy provided in Section 16 A (c) of the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO) 1999 might not be available to Zardari because of an unequivocal direction in paragraph No 37 (vi) of the SC’s January 7, 2019 order about filing of the references in Islamabad.
Naek in his arguments before the bench had said Section 16 A (c) is an independent right of an accused who may request the SC to transfer pending reference from an accountability court of one province to an accountability court of another province.
Earlier, lawyers had expressed serious reservations over the apex court’s January 7, 2019 direction to transfer corruption cases against Zardari from Karachi to Islamabad.
PPP Co-chairman Zardari on November 3, 2020 approached the Supreme Court, requesting it to transfer the graft cases filed against him in accountability courts of Islamabad to Karachi in view of his illness.
The four cases are: fake bank accounts reference, Park Lane Estate Private Ltd reference, Thatta Water Supply reference and Toshakhana corruption reference.
