ISLAMABAD -UNS: Objecting to the composition of the five-member Supreme Court bench, the federal government on Tuesday pleaded that three of those judges should recuse themselves from the audio leaks case.
In an application, the federal government argued that Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial, Justice Ijazul Ahsan and Justice Munib Akhtar should not hear the matter and a new bench be formed for the purpose. Justice Shahid Waheed and Justice Hasan Azhar Rizvi are the other members of the bench.
The federal government seemingly banked on the principle of conflict of interest, as it gave the reason that one of the audio leaks concerned Chief Justice Bandial‘s mother-of-law while the matter also involved Justice Ahsan and Justice Akhtar.
According to the application, previous court decisions and the judges’ code of conduct make it clear that no judge can hear a case involving his relative. In the past, the then chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had recused himself from the bench hearing Arsalan Iftikhar case.
The five-member bench will resume the hearing on Wednesday (tomorrow) after stopping the inquiry commission from investigating the matter.
Last week, the Supreme Court had halted the operations of the audio leaks commission following the order issued on the petitions filed by Imran Khan and others. The judgement, relying heavily on the principle of separation of powers, stated, “In as much as the Federal Government appeared to have acted unilaterally in this matter, a constitutional principle of the highest importance had been, prima facie, breached”.
