PM orders to withdraw baseless curative review against Justice Isa.

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif ordered the withdrawal of the curative review reference against Supreme Court’s senior-most judge Justice Qazi Faez Isa on Thursday, indicating that the government has decided not to pursue the matter further.

The decision has already been approved by the federal cabinet.

“The Prime Minister has directed Law Minister Senator Azam Nazir Tarar to withdraw the curative review reference against Justice Qazi Faiz Isa,” the Prime Minister Office said in an official statement.

On my direction, the government has decided to withdraw the Curative Review Petition against senior most Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Qazi Faez Isa. The Curative Review was based on ill-will & meant to harass & intimidate the honourable Judge at the behest of Imran Niazi.

— Shehbaz Sharif (@CMShehbaz) March 30, 2023

According to the statement, the premier said that Justice Isa and his family were harassed and defamed in the name of presidential reference.

“This was not a reference, it was a revenge action by [ex-PM] Imran Niazi, a vindictive person, against a fair-minded judge who followed the path of the Constitution and the law,” PM Shehbaz said while ordering to take back the case.

He furthered that filing of reference was “a nefarious conspiracy to divide the independence of the Judiciary and divide it,” saying the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and allied parties had condemned the “false reference” even during the opposition period.

“Imran Niazi abused the constitutional office of President for this criminal act,” Shehbaz said, adding that “President Arif Alvi became a tool in the attack on the Judiciary and an accomplice to a lie.”

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He insisted that lawyers’ organisations, including the Pakistan Bar Council, had also spoken out against it, and that the government respected their views.

The Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-led federal government filed a complaint with the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) on May 23, 2019, against Justice Isa and Sindh High Court judge Justice K K Agha for failing to disclose their families’ foreign assets in their wealth statements.

However, in June 2020, the Supreme Court dismissed both the presidential reference filed against Justice Isa and the SJC proceedings that were initiated as a result of the reference.

“Reference No 1 of 2019 is declared to be of no legal effect whatsoever and is quashed, and as a result, the proceedings pending in the SJC against the petitioner [Justice Isa], including the show-cause notice issued to him on 17.07.2019, stand abated,” said a brief order.

After hearing for more than six months a slew of petitions filed against the reference, a 10-judge full court issued the verdict, claiming that Justice Isa had committed misconduct by failing to disclose his family members’ properties in the UK in his wealth statement.

In April 2022, former Prime Minister Imran Khan admitted that filing a presidential reference to remove Justice Isa was a mistake. During a meeting with members of the Insaf Lawyers Forum (ILF), he admitted his “mistake.”