Sharif asks SC to club all references into one

ISLAMABAD: 

After the dismissal of his review petition, deposed prime minister Nawaz Sharif has once again approached the Supreme Court for revisiting the July 28 verdict, but only to the extent of its directions for the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) to file three references against him.

The petition was filed on Friday through Khawaja Haris under Article 184(3) of the Constitution, making the federal government, NAB, the accountability court, and Sharif’s children respondents.

The deposed PM has requested the apex court to declare that the directions in the July 28 verdict for NAB to file three references against him is, through lack of reference to precedent rulings, repugnant to the provisions of articles 4, 9, 10-A, 13, and 25 of the Constitution.

A larger bench of the apex court had on September 15 dismissed the Sharif family’s review petitions, but a detailed judgment is still awaited. Charges, however, have yet to be framed against Sharif or his children

A member of the Sharif’s legal team told The Express Tribune that there were two purposes of filing the constitutional petition – one, to remind the court of the inexplicable delay in releasing the detailed order with promised observations to protect the right to a fair trial; and two, to prevent three convictions for what could be considered a single offence under the law.

On the other hand, legal experts are pondering whether the SC can revisit its judgment after the dismissal of the review petition.

They believe that the court can pass any order at any time to ensure justice is served under Article 187 of Constitution. Likewise, there are precedents where the court revisited its verdicts after the dismissal of reviews. It is also interesting to see whether the SC registrar office entertains the petition and what will be the composition of the bench if it does.

Sharif has requested the SC to declare that multiple trials on a single charge would prejudice his fundamental rights, fair trial and protection against double punishment, guaranteed under Articles 4, 10-A and 13 of the Constitution.

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He has asked the top court to suspend the accountability court’s proceedings till the filing of a consolidated reference by NAB in respect of the alleged commission of an offence under Section 9(a)(v) of the National Accountability Ordinance (NAO).

The petition states that the filing of multiple references against an accused for each asset allegedly owned, possessed or acquired by him, disproportionate to his known sources of income, is repugnant to section 9 (a)(v) of the NAO.

“Separate trials of an accused for a single offence are contrary to the principles of the criminal justice and the procedure provided under the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC),” the petition adds.

Sharif has submitted that he did not take this ground in his review petition because he was unaware of the option, but now that the copies of the references have been provided to him and he has been able to go through their contents, it has become “crystal clear” that the allegations made against him in all three references are actually tantamount to the allegation of commission of one offence, and, as such, the filing of the three separate references and three separate trials for one alleged offence would be in violation of the provisions of Section 9(a)(v) of the NAO, 1999, as well as the guarantee of due process as envisaged in Article 4 of the Constitution, and the his fundamental rights under articles 10-A and 25 of the Constitution.

He has also stated that filing of multiple references against him shall also prejudice all future criminal trials in Pakistan, particularly cases involving allegations of acquisition of assets beyond means and, as such, merits setting aside in exercise of this SC’s jurisdiction under Article 184(3) of the Constitution or in terms of the court’s inherent jurisdiction and obligations.

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It is also submitted by the petitioner that during the hearing of the review petition, the bench had told him that it would make any necessary clarifications and observations to ensure that he gets a fair trial before the accountability court and that his legal rights to contest the references filed against him would be fully protected in terms of the independence of the accountability court in conducting the trial as well as in terms of the petitioner’s right to take all such legal objections before the trial court, as available to any other litigant.

However, the detailed order containing the observations and clarifications for the protection of the petitioner’s right to a fair trial has not yet been released by the court.

The petitioner has asked the SC to declare that an accused under section 9(a)(v) of NAO, 1999 shall be tried through a single reference, irrespective of the number of assets alleged to have been held by him on any such date that the reference is filed against him.