Attorney general Irfan Qadir was categorical in his September 25 letter to the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Fakhruddin G Ebrahim: “the Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has the exclusive obligation to determine the questions of disqualifications … [it is not supposed] to perform its functions on the directions of any court in Pakistan including the Supreme Court.” He then added a poorly concealed message for Ebrahim: if you abide by the court’s verdict without “determining whether the Supreme Court is mandated by the Constitution of Pakistan to issue directions to the ECP or not”, you will be violating your oath of office to “protecting and preserving the Constitution”. Qadir wrote the letter as he was “compelled to draw [the CEC’s] attention” to a September 20 decision of the Supreme Court which had disqualified 11 parliamentarians for holding dual nationalities.
The attorney general was clearly attempting to define the constitutional boundaries between the country’s supreme judicial forum and its highest election institution with an agenda: the Supreme Court should have nothing to do with disqualifying the members of the Parliament. But minus the political angle in his letter, this is what many others are also saying — that the Supreme Court is interfering with and encroaching upon ECP’s turf.
