ISLAMABAD: The ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) on Wednesday rejected the detailed verdict of the Supreme Court in the Panama Papers review petition, a statement issued after a high-level party meeting in Islamabad said.
Terming the verdict an ‘awful example of prejudice, bigotry, anger and provocation’, the party maintained that the apex court had attempted to influence the subordinate courts through the judgement. The language used in the detailed verdict was also not upto the judicial standards, said the statement. “According to constitutional and legal experts, what was said regarding Nawaz Sharif does not fit judicial language on any level,” it said, adding the contradictory words used against Nawaz should not be a matter of pride for any court.
Criticizing the apex court’s verdict, the PML-N said that poetry was used to question leadership. “It was the leaders who made sacrifices for the country, made Pakistan into a nuclear power, went through prison sentences, were hanged and exiled and now have been disqualified,” it said.
The Sharif family, without any reservations, acted upon the decisions taken by the court but remarks passed in the rallies of political opponents cannot be tolerated, the statement added.
In the verdict issued on Tuesday, the apex court had declared that Nawaz Sharif tried to fool the people, parliament and the court in the Panama Papers case. “He (Sharif) tried to fool the people inside and outside Parliament. He even tried to fool the court without realising that ‘you can fool all the people for some of the time, some of the people all the time but you cannot fool all the people all the time’. Refuge in evasive, equivocal and non-committal replies does not always help,” says the 23-page judgment authored by Justice Ejaz Afzal Khan on the dismissal of the review petitions filed by Nawaz Sharif, his children, and Finance Minister Ishaq Dar.
Published in Daily Times, November 9th 2017.
