The Supreme Court is hearing the 12-year-old presidential reference on revisiting the controversial death sentence awarded to PPP founder and former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto in 1978. A nine-member larger apex court bench headed by Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP) Qazi Faez Isa also includes Justice Sardar Tariq Masood, Justice Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Aminud Din Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi, and Justice Musarrat Hilali. “Court proceedings of the Presidential Reference No 1 of 2011 will be broadcast live and can be accessed on the official website and the YouTube channel of the Supreme Court,” stated a communique issued by the top court today. The decision to fix the instant case was made under Section 2(1) of the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act, 2023, by a three-member committee comprising CJP Isa, Justice Masood and Justice Ijaz Ul Ahsan. Former president Asif Ali Zardari, on April 2, 2011, approached the apex court through a presidential reference under Article 186 of the Constitution to seek its opinion on revisiting the trial of the PPP founder. Previously, an 11-member larger bench of the apex court, headed by former chief justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, had conducted five hearings on the presidential reference — whose last hearing was held on November 11, 2012. Attorney General for Pakistan (AGP) Mansoor Usman Awan is representing the federal government in the reference, while Farooq H Naek said he would represent the PPP chief who has applied to become a party in the matter. Advocate Ahmed Raza Kasuri, the man who had lodged the first information report (FIR) against the former prime minister, also appeared before the bench and requested the CJP to hear his arguments in the case as well. “Every legal heir has the right to be heard,” the CJP responded to his request. PPP leaders including Asif Zardari, Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and Sherry Rehman have also arrived at the top court to attend the hearing. Speaking to the media outside the SC, Rehman said an important day for the PPP has finally come after many years. “Qazi Faez Isa has fixed this case for hearing, better late than never,” she added. The PPP chairman Monday moved the Supreme Court of Pakistan seeking a live broadcast of the reference. Bilawal, in his civil miscellaneous application, had urged the court to allow the live telecast of the hearing “so that the whole of Pakistan could hear it”. The PPP chairman had also voiced his expectation from the chief justice to “rectify constitutional mistakes”. “The whole nation knows Quaid-e-Awaam was innocent The nation has to be informed who were the facilitators behind [Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s] murder,” Bilawal said during a political gathering in Kohat district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) on Sunday. “We hope that justice would be done with the history,” he added.
SC takes up long-pending reference against ZA Bhutto’s death sentence
