Islamabad [Pakistan], March 31 : Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday ordered Law Minister Azam Nazir Tarar to withdraw the curative review reference filed against Justice Qazi Faez Isa of the Supreme Court, Dawn reported.
Sharif termed the actions taken by the previous government as "flimsy" and on "baseless grounds."
Taking to his official Twitter handle, Shehbaz Sharif stressed that the curative review petition against Justice Qazi Faez Isa was based on "ill will" and meant to harass the judge.
He tweeted, "On my direction, the government has decided to withdraw the Curative Review Petition against senior most Judge of the Supreme Court, Justice Qazi Faez Isa. The Curative Review was based on ill-will & meant to harass & intimidate the honourable Judge at the behest of Imran Niazi."
Issued by Prime Minister's Office (PMO), Shehbaz Sharif said that Justice Isa and his family were "harassed and defamed" in the name of the reference, according to the Dawn report.
"This was not a reference, but a vendetta by Imran Khan Niazi, a vindictive person, against a fair-minded judge who followed the path of the Constitution and the law," the statement quoted Shehbaz Sharif as saying.
Shehbaz Sharif said that the reference was a nefarious conspiracy to divide the independence of the judiciary. He recalled that his party Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and alliance parties had condemned the move even when they were in the opposition.
"Imran Niazi misused the constitutional office of the president for this criminal act and President Arif Alvi became an instrument in the attack on the judiciary and an accomplice to a lie," Pakistan PM said as per the Dawn report.
The PMO statement further said that lawyer orgsations had opposed the reference.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf government had filed a reference against Justice Isa in May 2019, alleging that he acquired three properties in London on lease in the name of his wife and children between 2011 and 2015, as per the news report. However, he did not give details regarding them in his wealth returns.
Justice Qazi Faez Isa contested the allegation and said that he is not a beneficial owner of the flats. On June 19, 2020, a 10-member SC bench threw out the presidential reference against Justice Isa and termed it "invalid". However, seven of the 10 judges on the bench ordered the Inland Revenue Department and the Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) to seek explanations from the judge's wife and children on the nature and source of funding for three properties.
In 2021, Justice Isa secured a win in a case which set aside the Supreme Court's aforementioned directive after which the entire exercise carried out by the FBR was rendered null and void. Even after the reference was finally quashed, the PTI government instituted a curative review, which was still pending before the Supreme Court.
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