Top court to announce all-important SIC reserved seats ruling today

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court is all set to announce its highly anticipated ruling on the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI)-backed Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC) appeal regarding reserved seats today (Friday), according to a cause list issued on Thursday.

The apex court's full bench held its second consultative session on Thursday on the issue of the reserved seats case verdict. Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa headed a special session of the country's top court's 13-member full bench, the sources said, adding all the judges of the bench attended the session.

The cause list issued on the SC website following the meeting said a full bench led by CJP Isa will announce the short ruling at 12pm on Friday (July 12) on the SIC plea challenging the Peshawar High Court (PHC) decision upholding the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) move to deny the PTI-backed lawmakers reserved seats in the assemblies.

The apex court reserved the verdict on the SIC’s appeals on Tuesday after conducting nine hearings on the SIC's appeals with all parties including the federal government and the ECP presented their arguments against the SIC's plea.

The full bench also comprises Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Muneeb Akhtar, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Amin-ud-Din Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Athar Minallah, Justice Syed Hassan Azhar Rizvi, Justice Ayesha Malik, Justice Shahid Waheed, Justice Irfan Saadat Khan and Justice Naeem Akhtar Afghan.

What is reserved seats case?

The reserved seats' issue first emerged after over 80 PTI-backed independent candidates emerged victorious in the February 8 elections and subsequently joined the SIC in a bid to claim seats reserved for minorities and women.

However, the Imran Khan-founded party suffered a setback after the ECP, citing the party's failure to submit its list of candidates, denied allocating the reserved seats to the SIC.

The party then approached the PHC which upheld the electoral body's decision on the matter.

Subsequently, the SIC moved the apex court seeking to set aside the PHC verdict and the allocation of 67 women and 11 minority seats in the assemblies.

The allocation of reserved seats holds significance as the PTI-backed independent candidates, who make up the majority of the opposition benches, lost as many as 77 reserved seats in NA and provincial assemblies due to the PHC's verdict.

It is also to be noted that the PHC verdict allowing the allocation of reserved seats to the ruling coalition comprising the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N), the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) and others, led to them securing a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly.

The move propelled the PML-N's number in the lower house of parliament to 123, the PPP to 73, whereas the PTI-backed SIC number stood at 82.

A three-member SC bench comprising Justice Mansoor, Justice Minallah and Justice Mazhar, took up the SIC's plea on June 6 and suspended PHC's verdict as well as the ECP's decision on the said issue.

Following the SC's decision to suspend the ECP order, the coalition lost its two-thirds majority in the lower house.

The SIC's plea, however, has been opposed by both the federal government and the electoral body.

In its submission to the court via Attorney General of Pakistan (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan, the government has urged the apex court to reject the SIC's plea stressing that the reserved seats for minorities and women could be given to a political party which contested the polls and won at least one seat besides providing a list of candidates based on the total number of seats it won as per the law.

Meanwhile, the ECP has also adopted a somewhat similar argument contending that the party is not eligible to get reserved seats as it did not submit the list of candidates before the January 24 deadline.