TERENCE J SIGAMONY

ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) Thursday granted more time to Federal Minister for Water Resources Faisal Vawda to submit a reply, in the case where his disqualification is sought for allegedly concealing the US nationality at the time of filing of his nomination papers to contest the last general elections.

A single bench of the IHC comprising Justice Aamer Farooq heard the petition moved by Barrister Jahangir Jadoon against the federal minister, and deferred the hearing till December 15th, after Vawda’s new counsel sought some time for the preparation of the case.

During the hearing, the federal minister’s new counsel, Haroon Duggal Advocate, submitted his power of attorney for Faisal Vawda, and prayed before the court to grant some time for submission of comments in this petition.

At this, Justice Aamer said that the initial arguments in this case had been completed.

He added that the petitioner’s case was that Vawda was an American citizen at the time of submission of his nomination papers to the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP).

The court asked the lawyer to study this case as this was only related to dates.

The minister’s lawyer requested the court to direct the ECP to share those documents with him. Then, the IHC bench said that the nomination papers and affidavit were submitted by his client himself.

The petitioner’s lawyer said that this court had already given maximum time to the defence for filing comments.

He added that delaying tactics were being used to waste the court’s time.

The IHC bench remarked that it was a case of quo-warranto seeking disqualification of a member of the Parliament, and the court would follow the legal procedure, and then adjourned the hearing till December 15th.

In his petition, Mian Faisal Advocate stated that Vawda contested the elections from NA-249 (West-II) Karachi in July 2018 on a ticket of the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

However, he was a dual national at the time of filing of his nomination papers, concealing his Ameri­can nationality by falsely declaring on oath before the ECP that “he did not have any foreign nationality”.

The petition, while mentioning documents of Vawda rescinding US nationality, pointed out that the minister was a US citizen at the time of submitting his nomination papers on June 11, 2018, and even during the scrutiny of his nomination papers, while the returning officer of his electoral constituency approved his papers on June 18th.

The petition maintained, “It was only after this approval that respondent No 1 [Vawda] applied for renunciation of his US nationality at the US Consulate, Karachi, on June 22.”

It added that the US Consulate issued the renunciation certificate to Vawda on June 25.

Moreover, the petition stated that Vawda had on June 11, 2018 also submitted an affidavit claiming that he was not a dual national whereas, till that time, his foreign nationality was intact.