Justice Qazi Isa wants live coverage of his review petitions

Justice Qazi Faez Isa of the Supreme Court (SC) on Friday requested the apex court to show hearing of the review petitions he had filed against the presidential reference live, reported 24NewsHD TV channel. 

In his petition, the judge has requested the court that the hearing not only be shown live on private TV news channels but also on the state-owned media. 

Justice Isa regretted that content of the presidential reference was aired on media to malign him, and that, too, before copy of the reference was provided to him.

He argued that since a judge could not address a presser to defend himself, and that parties to his case had a monopoly over the media, hearing of review petitions be shown live.

Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf-led federal government, on May 23, 2019, had moved the Supreme Judicial Council (SJC) against Justice Isa and Sindh High Court judge K K Agha over non-disclosure of their families’ foreign assets in their wealth statements.

However, the lawyers’ fraternity described the reference as an attack on independent judges.

In October last year, a 10-member full court, led by Justice Umar Ata Bandial resumed hearing of the case while on the request of the Justice Isa, two SC judges namely Justice Ijazul Ahsan and Justice Sardar Tariq Masood recused themselves from hearing his case.