The Peshawar Excessive Court docket (PHC) on Thursday suspended a authorities discover ordering the inactive Deputy Speaker of the Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa Meeting Suraiya Bibi to vacate her official residence, allowed her to proceed dwelling there and directed law-enforcement companies to not arrest her.
A two-member bench comprising Justice Ijaz Anwar and Justice Faheem Wali issued the written order arising from the earlier listening to. Advocate Yasir Khattak appeared on behalf of the petitioner, the inactive Deputy Speaker.
In its detailed order, the court docket famous that the related presidential ordinance makes no point out of the workplaces of Speaker or Deputy Speaker. Equally, the executive directive requiring trip of official residences accommodates no reference to those constitutional posts. The judges subsequently discovered enough floor to remain the eviction course of pending additional examination of the authorized place.
Learn: PHC stays arrest of Ok-P Meeting deputy speaker, orders de-sealing of official residence
Throughout arguments, counsel for the petitioner contended that the Ok-P Meeting Speaker and Deputy Speaker Act 2026 confers a transparent authorized proper on the Deputy Speaker to occupy the official residence all through her time period. He additional argued that law-enforcement companies are barred from conducting any raid or taking coercive motion in opposition to the residence whereas the office-holder stays in place.
Opposing the petition, the Advocate Basic submitted that an emergency empowers the provincial authorities to reclaim official residences allotted to ministers, advisers and the Deputy Speaker. He additionally apprised the court docket {that a} felony case underneath Part 406 of the Pakistan Penal Code has already been registered in opposition to the Deputy Speaker on the grievance of the Deputy Commissioner of Chitral.
After listening to each side, the bench suspended the discover to vacate the residence, expressly authorised the petitioner to stay in occupation and ordered that she shouldn’t be arrested. The matter can be taken up once more on the following date of listening to.
The ruling offers quick reduction to the inactive Deputy Speaker and locations the burden on the provincial authorities to justify the eviction drive in gentle of the statutory protections obtainable to the holder of the workplace.
