ISLAMABAD, Jan 01 (NNI): The commission formed to probe the Faizabad sit-in has summoned PML-N President Shehbaz Sharif, who was serving as the Punjab chief minister back then, to appear in person on Jan 3 (Wednesday) and record his account of developments leading to and during the event.
Sources say the inquiry commission has also prepared a questionnaire for Shehbaz so that all the details could be obtained for preparing a detailed report which is to be submitted to the Supreme Court on the 22nd of this month.
The panel had previously interviewed the then prime minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi and Ahsan Iqbal who was part of his cabinet as interior minister.
However, Lt-Gen (retd) Faiz Hameed failed to comply with the notice and didn’t appear for questioning, resulting in the issuance of an another one.
Faiz was DG Counter Intelligence in the ISI – Pakistan’s premier spy agency – at the time the sit-in was held. Later he went to head the organisation after the PTI founding chairman being the country’s prime minister removed the current army chief Gen Asim Munir from the post.
In November last year, the federal government had formed the three-member commission after the Supreme Court rejected a fact-finding committee authorised Islamabad to investigate the matter.
The commission constituted under Section 3 of the Pakistan Commission of Inquiry Act, 2017, is mandated with investigating the sit-in stage by late Khadim Hussain Rizvi-led Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) to identify those who planned, financed, and supported the affair that disrupted lives in Rawalpindi and Islamabad in November 2017.
“[The commission] will fix responsibility of any person and/or government officers including those working with intelligence agencies; determine as to whether any disciplinary proceedings or other legal action is required to be taken against any of the aforesaid, if found involved,” read the commission’s terms of reference (ToRs).
A Justice Qazi Faez Isa-led bench in February 2019 had announced a famous verdict which thrashed the role of intelligence agencies in the affair. The judgment later led to filing of a presidential reference against him in attempt to remove him from the country’s top court. However, he managed to survive the bid and assumed the office of chief justice last year.
One of first moves after becoming the Supreme Court chief justice was listing for hearing the petitions against the February 2019 verdict. But most of the petitioners challenging the judgment started withdrawing their pleas as a three-member bench led by the chief justice took up the case. NNI
