SIC reserved seats case

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Pakistan Reserve Seats Case
CourtSupreme Court of Pakistan
Full case nameElection Commission of Pakistan through Chief Election Commissioner, Islamabad v. Salman Akram Raja and others
CitationSupremecourt.gov, Online Case Status
Case history
Prior actions
Appealed fromPTI lawyers of the Sunni Ittehad Council
Appealed toSupreme Court of Pakistan
Court membership
Judges sittingQazi Faez Isa, Aminuddin Khan, Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Naeem Akhtar Afghan, Aqeel Ahmed Abbasi

The Chief Election Commissioner, ECP v. Salman Akram Raja, PTI, informally referred to as the Pakistan Reserved Seats Case, is a pending court case which involves the high bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan (SCP), notably comprising Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa, and several other high justices. In this case, lawyers from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) under the wing of the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) have challenged the Pakistani Election Commission’s decision of not giving allocated reserve seats in the National Assembly of Pakistan, Provincial Assembly of the Punjab, Provincial Assembly of Sindh, and Provincial Assembly of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa for women and minorities to SIC members, and instead the ECP gave the seats to additional parties, hence the PTI challenged it in the SCP.

Reserve Seats

In Pakistan, each provincial assembly and the National Assembly has are a certain number of reserve seats to be given to women or religious minorities from a winning party in the assembly, with reserve seats being granted on proportional representation between the elected parties in the assembly as per the Constitution and Elections Act, 2017.[1]

For the 2024 Pakistani election, PTI candidates were forced to run as independents due to the linked Intra party elections case, but later declared that they were under the Sunni Ittehad Council, a close PTI ally, they had done this for legal purposes.[2]

Currently reserve seats are key, as the current Shehbaz Sharif government is formed on the basis of a 2/3 Majority, a majority that they would not have without reserve seats.[1]

Arguments

The PTI’s argument for granting the reserve seats to PTI members was that by law, reserve seats are granted to the already elected parties in an assembly based on proportional representation. PTI-backed candidates hold 84 seats under Sunni Ittehad Council in the National Assembly and therefore a certain amount of the proportional representation of the 60 seats for women and 10 minority seats should be granted to the SIC, according to the PTI argument.[3][4]

The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) and Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa’s argument is that since the PTI members under the SIC registered as Independent candidates for the 2024 elections, that they would not receive reserve seats, as they contested as independent. The argument is also that the SIC did not file candidates beforehand for reserve seat holders, as required, though the PTI did.[1]

The clashing arguments have used past examples from the 2018 election to interpret the situation, primarily the Constitution and Elections Act, 2017.[1]

Case details

On May 6, 2024, a three-judge SCP bench overturned the Peshawar High Court’s ruling that had granted the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) 77 reserved seats, but instead gave the seats to other political parties in various assemblies. The ruling coalition's two-thirds majority was instantly lost as a result of the Supreme Court bench's decision, temporarily.[1][5]

The SCP has questioned whether the SIC qualifies for the allocation of the reserved seats as do other political parties such as the PML-N, PPP, JUI-F and MQM-P, which have been allocated the reserved seats.

The SIC case differs from the other parties' because, as mandated by Section 104 of the Elections Act, 2017, it did not provide a priority list of its candidates for the two categories of reserved seats (women and minorities) for each assembly before to the general election. As a result, the SIC candidates for the reserved seats also failed to turn in their nomination documents.[1]

Justice Athar Minallah criticized the Election Commission of Pakistan for its failure in not giving reserve seats to the SIC.[6] Currently the case has been adjourned and delayed several times, though is still underway and the verdict is pending.

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Mehboob, Ahmed Bilal (2024-05-18). "Saga of reserved seats". DAWN.COM. Retrieved 2024-07-05.
  2. ^ Business Standard, Independent candidates to join rightwing Sunni Ittehad Council: Imran's PTI
  3. ^ Hussain, Abid. "Why is Pakistan's PTI fighting for reserved seats in parliament?". Al Jazeera. Retrieved 2024-07-05.
  4. ^ Raza, Syed Irfan (2024-07-04). "PTI casts aspersions on bench hearing reserved seats case". DAWN.COM. Retrieved 2024-07-05.
  5. ^ Momand, Abdullah (2024-05-31). "SC forms full court to hear reserved seats case on Monday". DAWN.COM. Retrieved 2024-07-05.
  6. ^ ABBASI, JEHANZEB (2024-06-29). "Justice Minallah criticises ECP's verdict in SIC reserved seats case". The Express Tribune. Retrieved 2024-07-05.
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