A five-member bench of the Lahore High Court (LHC) on Wednesday (today) heard Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi’s plea challenging Governor Balighur Rehman’s orders to de-notify him as CM.
During the hearing, Justice Abid Aziz Sheikh remarked that the governor can ask a chief minister to take a vote of confidence from the assembly.
While Elahi’s lawyer Barrister Ali Zafar responded that his client became the chief minister by taking votes in the assembly, Justice Hafeez said that the chief minister should always have the support of the majority of the lawmakers (186 members) in the house.
At one point, Justice Sheikh said that if a consensus could not be reached between the governor and the chief minister, then the case would be heard on “merit”.
“The matter has now prolonged beyond a reasonable time,” he remarked, adding that the court would have to look at assembly dissolution, violation of the governor’s orders, and the way forward.
In the late hours of December 22, Rehman denotified Elahi as CM. At the time, the governor had said that since the chief minister had refrained from taking a vote of confidence at the appointed day and time, he ceased to hold office.
Subsequently, Elahi approached the court, saying the move was “unconstitutional, unlawful and of no legal effect”.
LHC later reinstated Elahi as the chief minister after he assured the court that he would not dissolve the Punjab Assembly until the next hearing, which was held today.
This a developing story.
Leave a Reply