Pakistan: PTI to approach Supreme Court over resignations of National Assembly members

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has decided to approach the Supreme Court over the issue of the resignations of its party members, The Express Tribune reported.

The party has decided to take up the issue at the apex court where an application will be moved next week as the resignations of PTI lawmakers of the National Assembly have not been accepted by the speaker.

According to The Express Tribune, Chaudhry Faisal Hussain, advocate representing the PTI General Secretary Asad Umar, has already filed a petition in the Supreme Court against the Islamabad High Court's (IHC) decision for not giving a declaration that the acceptance of the resignations of 123 lawmakers by the then deputy speaker had come into effect and the speaker has no power concerning verification thereof.

Furthermore, PTI had urged the IHC to make another declaration that the speaker is bound to forward the 123 accepted resignations of PTI members of the National Assembly to Pakistan's Election Commission to allow it to denotify all the 123 members and announce the schedule for the by-election. However, the petition was rejected by the then IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah.

While rejecting the petition, the Islamabad High Court Chief Justice referred to a 2015 judgement wherein it was said that for a resignation to come into effect under Article 64 of the Constitution, it was not enough that the member has written it under his or her name addressed to the speaker, as per The Express Tribune report.

Earlier this week, Pakistan National Assembly Speaker Raja Pervez Ashraf rejected the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf's (PTI) demand for the acceptance of en masse resignations of the members of the National Assembly (MNAs), reiterating his stance that each member needs to come individually with a hand-written resignation for verification as per the rules of the National Assembly, according to The News International.

In a meeting with a PTI delegation led by Pakistan's former National Assembly speaker Asad Qaiser on Thursday, Raja Pervez Ashraf said that the resignations of PTI MNAs could only be accepted under the procedure given in the Constitution and rules of business of the National Assembly, as per The News International report.

Speaking to PTI's delegation, Raja Pervez Ashraf said that the resignations accepted by Qasim Suri were unconstitutional and illegal. Notably, 123 PTI members of the National Assembly collectively tendered resignation on April 11, two days after party Chairman Imran Khan was ousted as the Prime Minister through a no-confidence motion.

( With inputs from ANI )