"Yeh NAB Ka Qanoon Waisi Ghalat Qanoon Tha...," President SCBA Abid Zuberi
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00:00 and anticipated it was. Some say it was a great decision. Legally speaking, what are your thoughts on this decision?
00:07 In the name of Allah, the most Gracious, the most Merciful. Look, the reaction to this decision will have to be seen by the public.
00:15 You are from the media, look, are the public happy with this decision? Look, accountability, no one can disagree that accountability should be there.
00:25 And as you just said about Ahtef sahib, about Shah Khan Abbasi sahib, he said it should be across the board and for everyone.
00:33 But the main issue is that I see this decision as a correct decision. The decision is correct because you see,
00:42 this parliament was a truncated parliament. This parliament was not complete. The two amendments that were made,
00:49 you see, they were made for their own benefit, they ended their cases. If they had not done this, it would have been much better.
00:55 Look, if all these people say that we are all innocent, these are false and political cases made against us,
01:01 then they should have gone and ended it. What was the need to bring such amendments?
01:07 Look, the perception and the talk that was made that you changed the definition of anonymity, its definition,
01:15 then you said that 50 crore thing, you did it. Then you, look, the main issue was where should the accountability of the public office holder be?
01:23 Look, in anti-corruption laws, public servant is accountable. Where should these people be held accountable?
01:31 This was it. I have always had a view that this NAB law was wrong anyway. You see, I just heard Rana Sanawallah sahib,
01:40 he had a draconian law. Look, it was a draconian law, it was made, but look, in a 2001 judgment of the Supreme Court,
01:47 in which it was thoroughly reviewed and after that many amendments were made in it and after that this law was in force.
01:55 But where this law was used against the people who were being unjustly treated, it was used against political opponents.
02:02 You did not let this law be implemented. I have always had a view that such laws should not be used against political opponents.
02:12 Cases should be made against them and they should be harassed. When they come to the opposition, you should come in.
02:17 But the law making of a person is wrong. It has to be seen that this law, these amendments,
02:25 which the Supreme Court has said today, are against the fundamental rights of the law.
02:32 That is why they have declared them, maintained certain provisions of their law.
02:36 So you will have to see all these things, what reaction comes after this, cases will open up.
02:41 You yourself heard the statement of the chairman, Bilal Bhutto sahib, he said that he had it with us before and we will face it.
02:47 So the issue is that the law has taken action against them.
02:53 Okay, Jahangir Jadoon sahib, one thing is very important in this, that usually a decision of the Supreme Court is made
03:00 and after that we see the review, so there is no change in it.
03:04 But here it is that the Chief Justice of Pakistan has finished his term and other Chief Justices will come.
03:11 So obviously I feel that if they go for the review, they will go to them.
03:14 So this will make a difference on some cases and the option of review is still there.
03:18 Bismillah-ur-Rahman-ur-Rahim, see the review is given by the constitution and the rules of the Supreme Court,
03:26 under Order 26, Rule 2, you can do the review within 3-4 days.
03:30 And in this, I don't know if the KTG government will want to do this review or the NAAB government will want to do it,
03:37 this is still an uncertainty that who will do the review, the file or the federation will do it.
03:41 So if there is a review in this, then there will definitely be an issue that one judge will do it.
03:47 Why will the NAAB do it? Their rights have been violated.
03:50 There is a perception that who is aggrieved by this order and who will do the review.
03:56 So if they do the review, then obviously one judge has given a dissenting note that the Chief Justice will retire.
04:02 So this judgment will be left to the judge of one judge.
04:07 So if a new bench is formed, then if it is for a review, then definitely they can do the review.
04:12 But the scope of the review is limited.
04:14 Now the person who will do the review, will have to tell it in a firm way that this is a violation of the Prima Fischa judgment.
04:22 So if you give me a little permission, then I will tell it to your viewers.
04:27 First, there is a perception that this should not have been the amendment that someone has got NRO.
04:32 And as Mr. Zabari said, this is not a personal specific law. I disagree with him.
04:37 In this, 598 references are separate from the NAAB court.
04:42 Now 598 references are not against any one person.
04:44 At least 500-600 people are involved in this. It is not personal specific.
04:48 And the biggest beneficiary of this amendment is the Chief Justice PTI when he made the amendment that the remand should be reduced by 90 days.
04:56 And the bail trial court...
04:58 But he himself went against this matter.
05:01 He was also told by the Chief Justice of the I-Court that you are taking advantage of NAAB at the same time you have challenged the Supreme Court.
05:09 So we see that accountability across the border should be there and there should not be witch hunting and political victimization.
05:17 If you look at the history of Pakistan, since the time it was made, sometimes there is ABDO, sometimes there is PORODA, sometimes there is the Accountability Act of 1987,
05:24 sometimes there is the Draconian Law, which you say was the birth of the Martial Law.
05:30 So political parties should do this with maturity that there should be a law on which everyone is agreed on stakeholder and then it should not be used for political victimization.
05:41 And this is a perception that is made that it is against PDM.
05:43 The main parties of PDM, PMLN, they say that all people have spent 90 days remand and have come, some have 2 years, some have 1 year, some have 1.5 years, they have come with the punishment.
05:55 So tell me that NAAB, till date, the accountability laws, we say to some public office holders that they are ministers, MNAs, how much recovery has been done till date?
06:05 We just say that...
06:07 I will talk about this later. Let this point remain here. We will talk about this later.
06:12 We will take a reaction from Mr. Shahbaz Khosla and then of course we will include this in the discussion later.
06:16 Mr. Shahbaz, what is your reaction to this decision?
06:19 And the second is that this caretaker government can go into review.
06:23 Do you think this is possible or will any elected government go into review in this regard if you want to go?
06:29 Look, first of all, the reaction given by the political parties, the reaction given by Mr. Rana, it sounds as if he wants this to be across the board and other parties should also face it.
06:41 So he is agreeing with the judgment. He is agreeing that in this judgment, NAAB has been dismissed.
06:48 The draconian measures of this will be used on PTI as well.
06:51 So I don't think they should file a review of this judgment.
06:55 The purpose was that they made four amendments phase-wise from 2002 till the time of this judgment, four amendments were made.
07:09 And they were put in the tailor.
07:11 Some companies' cases were on 49 crores, so they reduced it to go to the upper NAAB.
07:18 Similarly, they removed the holders of public office from the middle and added that there should be an allegation and a clarification in the middle of taking illegal money.
07:32 So they kept removing people and made amendments until they were not completed.