The Supreme Court was empowered under the Constitution to order and give directions to any institution in the country, legal expert Hamid Khan said on Friday.
“The SC can order that you have to provide this money or whatever is the direction and that has to be implemented,” he said at Shaukat Piracha show Rubaroo. PTI chief Imran Khan’s focal person Rauf Hassan, Justice (retd) Shaiq Usmani, and PPP leader Faisal Karim Kundi were the other guests on the show aired on Aaj News.
He was responding to a query about whether the top court can directly order the State Bank of Pakistan to release the money. “It is in the jurisdiction of the SC. The Constitution is clear that in order to follow the orders of SC all authorities on the side of the executive are bound to observe it and follow it.”
The apex court has directed the central bank to release funds worth Rs21 billion for elections in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. It also ordered the SBP to send an “appropriate communication” to this effect to the finance ministry by Monday (April 17).
The development had come a day after the National Assembly rejected a money bill that the government had tabled to seek funds for conducting polls in Punjab and KP.
When asked whether the top court could send the whole assembly packing, Khan said the prime minister and the cabinet would be responsible in case of any violation. The assembly has no option because there are some funds which are mentioned in the Constitution. He spoke about the consolidated fund set up for federal and provincial.
“It is not the money that is kept in it and withdrawn,” he said, adding that the expenditure includes the remuneration of SC and high court judges. There was no option on it whether it is approved in the budget or not, he added.
“It is already charged upon the federal consolidated fund. So similarly the expenses of the election as per the constitution are also charged on the federal consolidated fund,” Khan said.
But Justice (retd) Shaiq Usmani was of the view that the top court “overstepped a bit” in its authority by ordering the central bank. He recalled the April 4 ruling of the SC, saying that the order was directed towards the federal government. According to the procedure, Usmani said that to whom the order was given he/she should be made accountable rather than the subordinates. “If this continues to happen then the whole system will mess up.”
The top court should have straight away summoned the PM and the matter could have been resolved, he said. He lamented that the April 14’s decision would set a “new tradition” of ordering the government’s subordinates. It would damage the system and the SC’s stature, he warned.
PTI’s Rauf Hassan stated Article 84 (supplementary and excess grants) of the Constitution to make his argument which said that “the Federal Government shall have power to authorize expenditure from the Federal Consolidated Fund, whether the expenditure is charged by the Constitution upon that Fund or not, and shall cause to be laid before the National Assembly a Supplementary Budget Statement or, as the case may be, an Excess Budget Statement, setting out the amount of that expenditure, and the provisions of Articles 80 to 83 shall apply to those statements as they apply to the Annual Budget Statement.”
He added that the approval for the expenditure expensed from the fund was taken in the next year’s budget. “This is the prerogative of the government to take out the fund when needed and for this, the prior approval is not needed,” Hassan said.
He went on to add that the bill rejected by the government was in violation of the Constitution as elections have not been held 90 days after the dissolution of the assemblies. Hassan accused the government of trying to validate the unconstitutional act by the legislation.
PPP’s Kundi, who later joined the show, lamented that despite the 50 years passing of the Constitution there was still a debate on “who will run the country”. He called for ending the interference institutions while speaking about the top court Friday’s order.
He wondered why the budget was tabled in Parliament if funds have to be given in the described by the legal expert Khan from the consolidated fund. Kundi stressed the need for dialogue to resolve the crisis.
Before the start of the show, Piracha had run bits of Law Minister Azam Nazeer Tarar in which he claimed that the perception related to the division in the judiciary was getting stronger day by day. Tarar had made such comments in his last press conference after the SC decision.
When asked about such an impression, Rauf claimed that it was nothing new and the only difference this time was that it became open because a few political parties were allegedly trying to divide it.
He claimed that with a standing of 55%, the existing Parliament did not have the mandate and described it as a “truncated Parliament”.
“I feel but I have a conviction that it has no authority to adopt any law unless it completes the constitutionally mandated members. Half of Parliament is considering it full and you have sat stooges in the opposition,” he said and claimed that there was no one-man show after the unanimous decision passed by the eight-member SC bench.
According to Justice (retd) Usmani, a “divided” SC impression was “dangerous”.
Piracha shared the past court judgements that led to the execution of former prime minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, Yousaf Raza Gilani’s disqualification, and the Panama leak saga. He asked Kundi, who is a special assistant to the PM on poverty alleviation and social safety, how the government was confident against the backdrop of such cases.
He reiterated that political forces have to sit together to resolve the crisis or else they would have to bear the brunt of the repercussions. Kundi lamented that the people have come up with their own interpretation of the Constitution amid the lack of discourse.
Legal expert Khan exhorted that political parties should not try to exacerbate the differences among judges. He accused the parties in the ruling alliance of making such attempts in order to take political advantage, which is against the country’s benefit and the purpose of the Constitution.He advised PTI’s Imran Khan to be careful while giving comments on the SC.
The PTI chief told reporters during his court appearance that it would a tragedy for the country if the apex court stands “divided”.
When asked about the apparent burden on the army chief of the PM in case of availability of personnel amid the security situation, Hamid Khan said that the army chief was part of the executive and constitutionally the PM as chief executive has the function to provide security via police, rangers, and army. It was his decision as an order for election has been passed and the cabinet and PM have the responsibility to provide security, he added.
“Basically the COAS follows the federal government. He is appointed by the federal government. I am not talking about the ground realities, as per the Constitution provision. The government has to tell them when they need them and they are bound to it when the PM or central government says it,” he said.
On the show, PPP’s Kundi urged the prime minister to call an all-parties conference to have a dialogue on the issues.
“Are we waiting for another tragedy for sitting together,” he asked.
