As the clock ticks for the appointment of the new chief justice of Pakistan, the registrar of the Supreme Court has submitted the names of three most senior judges to the parliamentary special committee tasked with making the decision.
According to sources, the names were requested from the incumbent chief justice of Pakistan through the court registrar. The three senior judges whose names have been forwarded are Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Muneeb Akhtar, and Justice Yahya Afridi.
These names will now be considered by the committee, which will make its final recommendation for the new chief justice. The committee will send its recommendation to the prime minister for final approval, who will then forward the name to the president for appointment.
The newly formed 12-member special parliamentary committee will convene today to finalize the name of the new chief justice of Pakistan.
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The meeting, scheduled for 4pm, will consider the names of the three most senior judges of the Supreme Court. The decision is supposed to be reached by a two-thirds majority and will then be forwarded to the prime minister for approval.
The committee includes four members from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), three from the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), and three jointly from the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Sunni Ittehad Council. The Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI) and Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) each have one representative on the panel.
The members of the committee come from both houses of parliament, including four senators and eight members of the National Assembly. PML-N’s Azam Nazir Tarar, Khawaja Asif, Ahsan Iqbal, and Shaista Parvaiz Malik are among the committee members, alongside PPP’s Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, Farooq H. Naik, and Naveed Qamar.
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The opposition is represented by Barrister Gohar, Ali Zafar, and Sahibzada Hamid Raza, while MQM’s Rana Ansar and JUI’s Kamran Murtaza are also part of the decision-making process.
The formation of this special committee follows letters written by the Senate chairman and speaker of the National Assembly to major political parties to nominate members in proportion to their representation in parliament. A notification has been issued regarding the committee's formation.
The committee has to reach a decision by midnight today, after which the selected name will be forwarded to Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, who will then send it to the president for formal approval. Upon receiving presidential consent, an official notification will be issued, and Pakistan’s new chief justice will assume office.
