Notices issued to Tareen, federal govt over 'disqualified lawmaker convening official meeting'

The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Friday issued notices to Jahangir Tareen and the federal government and sought their reply on a petition submitted against Tareen for convening and chairing an official meeting of top government officials despite being disqualified for life.

On Sept 13, the former parliamentarian convened a meeting of the Livestock Emergency Working Group that had been assigned to develop a concrete plan to deliver on the prime minister’s commitment to revamping the livestock sector under the ‘Uplift Agriculture and Conserve Water’ theme of the new government’s 100-day agenda.

A lawyer, Chaudhry Shoaib Saleem, filed the petition on Wednesday pleading that Tareen was disqualified by the Supreme Court [last year] for being not “Sadiq and Amin” under Article 62(1)(f) of the Constitution and Section 99 of the Representation of People Act (Ropa).

He stated that it was an open secret that Tareen has been involved in all lobbying for making of the government, whether provincial or the federal, and participated in various meetings held at the Prime Minister Secretariat illegally and unlawfully.

He said a disqualified person has no such legal and constitutional mandate even to have sitting in such meetings for being dishonest as declared by the SC.

The petitioner argued that the media widely reported that a disqualified person held a key meeting of top government officials at the secretariat of prime minister which created many questions in the minds of the public at large regarding the sanctity of court orders.

The petitioner added that Tareen had given a briefing as well as orders during the official meeting.

In the petition, he had asked the court to summon Tareen and seek an explanation that under what authority of the law had he convened and chaired an official meeting of government officials. He further asked the court to permanently restrain the prime minister from allowing Tareen to participate in any official meeting in any manner and capacity whatsoever.

Issuing notices, the court adjourned the hearing until Dec 4.