Supreme Court Suspends Membership of 28 Lawmakers

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court (SC) has suspended the membership of 28 parliamentarians and provincial assembly members elected during by-polls after the 18th amendment.
The legislators will remain suspended until the passage of the 20th Amendment.
A four member bench of the SC comprising of Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, Justice Khilji Arif Hussain, Justice Tariq Pervez and Justice Sarmad Jalal Usmani heard the petition filed by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) Chairman Imran Khan.
The28 members suspended by the Supreme Court include three senators out of which two are working as federal ministers while nine are members of the National Assembly, 8 MPA’s from Punjab, 4 from Sindh, 2 from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 1 from Balochistan.
The members include Federal Minister for Finance Senator Abdul Hafeez Sheikh, Minister for Petroleum Dr Asim Hussain, Senator Syed Sajid Hussain while nine MNAs are Chaudhary Asghar Ali Jutt of PPP, Jamshed Ahmed Dasti of PPP, Muhammad Akhtar Khan Kanju (Independent), Sardar Shafqat Hayat Khan (PML-N), Ch Tassaduq Masud Khan (PPP), Haji Khuda Bux Rajar (PML-F), Ms Khadija Aamir Yar Malik (PPP), Sardar Mumtaz Khan (PML-N), Sardar Awais Ahmed Khan Leghari (PML-Q).
The MPA’s include Syed Basit Ahmed Sultan, Mian Muhammad Ajmal Asif, Ahmed Mujtaba Gilani, Sardar Meer Badshah Qaisrani, Malik Saif-ul-Malook Khokhar, Ijaz Ahmed Khatoon, Malik Ghulam Raza, Saifuddin Khalid, Ghulam Qadir Khan Bettani, Muhammad Rashad Khan, Maulvi Muhammad Sarwar Musakhel ,Humaira Awais Shahid, Rana Rizvi, Arif Masih, Rasheed Khan Bhai and Chettan Mal.
Earlier on January 19 during the hearing of the case, the CJ remarked that the court will have to annul the by-elections, in case the Constitution is not amended.
The court gave the government till February 6 to adopt the 20th Amendment of the Constitution. Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry said that if the Constitution is not amended by February 6, then the court will have to annul by-elections as unconstitutional, as there are over 3,500,000 bogus votes in the old lists.

Source: Pkcolumns