Two separate applications were submitted with the apex court on Saturday – one seeking the closure of Mansoor Ijaz’s evidence for his failure to appear before the judicial commission and the other requesting the court to direct the commission to record his evidence anywhere outside Pakistan.
Watan Party chief Barrister Zafarullah filed the application, asking the court to close the evidence of Mansoor Ijaz, one of the main characters in the memo case, for not appearing before the commission.
He asked the court that a statement of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) director general be recorded instead.
In his petition sent to the court through a courier service, Zafarullah said Ijaz was befooling the people of Pakistan, as he had not appeared before the court in three consecutive hearings despite committing that he would depose before the commission.
“He was asked by the judicial commission to appear on January 9, 16 and 24 to record his evidence in the memo case. But he did not appear. So I have requested the court that it would be better to save time and the evidence of Ijaz should be closed as proviso of Article 46 of the constitution under which, if primary evidence is delayed or is expensive, the court may record the secondary evidence,” said Zafarullah while talking to Pakistan Today.
He said in this case, the court may record the statement of the ISI DG who had visited Ijaz and seen the evidence.
“So in order to proceed further, the court may record General Pasha’s statement as evidence,” he added.
On the other hand, the counsel for Mansoor Ijaz, Akram Shaikh, also filed a petition with the court that an order be passed to the memo commission to record the statement of Ijaz somewhere abroad due to security threats to his client.
Shaikh also contended that situation reflected that the army, government and the US administration had reached a settlement on the memo issue, but the court should settle the controversy.
Petitions moved for closure of Mansoor Ijaz’s evidence, recording of statement abroad
