*LAHORE* – Lahore High Court new full bench has been formed to decide apetition challenging the National Accountability Ordinance of 1999 as wellas the conviction of former prime minister Nawaz Sharif, his daughterMaryam Nawaz, and son-in-law Captain (retd) Muhammad Safdar in theAvenfield properties case.
The new bench headed by Justice Shahid Waheed, and including Justices AtirMahmood and Shahid Jamil Khan will hold its first hearing on August 27.
On August 8, a full bench hearing the petition was dissolved after itshead, Justice Shams Mahmood Mirza, declined to hear the petition.
A single bench comprising Justice Ali Akbar Qureshi had on July 19 referredthe petition as well as an application moved by Advocate A K Dogar to theCJ for constitution of a larger bench. Justice Qureshi maintained thatlegal points raised in the petition were important in nature and requiredto be decided by a larger bench.
Mr Dogar submitted in the application that Nawaz Sharif, his daughterMaryam Nawaz and son-in-law Capt (retd) Safdar were convicted under a law,passed by a military dictator, that was dead now.
Referring to the accountability court that sentenced Nawaz, Maryam andSafdar, he said a court established under a dead law could not claimjurisdiction to try and convict anyone. Therefore, he requested the courtto suspend the accountability court’s judgement.