Islamabad
\nSenate has passed the Constitution (26th Amendment) Act, 2024, with members of the House voting in favour of 22 clauses.
\nThe bill, better known as the Consti\u00actutional Package, is legislation proposing a set of constitutional amendments, including the extension of the chief justice\u2019s term. A special parliamentary committee formed last month \u2014 which has the representation of all parties, including the PTI \u2014 had been discussing various proposals.
\nThe bill, which was approved by the federal cabinet earlier in the day with the consensus of the government\u2019s coalition partners, was presented in the Senate today by Law Minister Tarar.
\nAccording to a statement from the Prime Minister\u2019s Office (PMO) released in the afternoon today, the cabinet decided to approve the bill \u201cin the wider interest of the country while adhering to the oath of national development and public welfare.\u201d At the beginning of the session, the law minister presented the bill following which senators delivered their speeches.
\nOnce the bill was officially tabled, Senate Chairman Yousaf Raza Gilani read out the contents of the amendment bills and asked lawmakers to cast their votes.
\nSpeaking about speculations regarding the extension of the chief justice\u2019s tenure in the Constitutional Package, Tarar clarified that Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa was not interested in any extension.
\n\u201cDuring the three meetings that I had with the top judge, he reiterated his disinterest in the extension of his tenure, saying that any amendments would come into effect after his retirement,\u201d Tarar said.
\nBefore the Senate session, the law minister also addressed a press conference at Parliament House, flanked by Information Minister Attaullah Tarar. During the presser, he outlined the contents of the bill and said that a constitutional bench would be formed by a judicial commission led by the Chief Justice of Pakistan (CJP).
\n\u201cBefore the 18th Amendment, judges were appointed by the President on the advice of the PM,\u201d Tarar said.
\n\u201cThis \u2018new-face\u2019 commission will be made up of the CJP, four of the senior-most Supreme Court judges, two senators and two MNAs \u2014 one of each will be from the opposition,\u201d the law minister said. \u201cWe are aiming to achieve a broader consensus with this commission,\u201d he added.
\nThe minister said that he and the attorney general will also be a part of the commission.
\n\u201cMarginalised communities and those whose fundamental rights need to be enforced, such as women and minorities, will be appointed by the National Assembly Speaker,\u201d he added. \u201cWe will also bring in someone from outside parliament as a technocrat, who can provide input based on their experience.\u201d
\nIn terms of the provincial judiciary, Tarar also said a performance evaluation system was being introduced to assess the performance of judges.
\n\u201cPeople complain that their cases are pending for up to 10 years,\u201d he said. \u201cThis judicial commission needs to enforce a nationwide standard, so the performance of high court judges will be evaluated.\u201d
\nTarar continued: \u201cWe need to appreciate the judges who perform well, but in the past, we have received complaints that after confirmation, their work is inadequate. We need to ensure that taxpayers\u2019 money is being well spent, and when the judiciary is receiving such perks, we expect results. \u201cCases where there is inefficiency will be referred to the Supreme Judicial Council,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Islamabad Senate has passed the Constitution (26th Amendment) Act, 2024, with members of the House voting in favour of 22 clauses. The bill, better known as the Consti\u00actutional Package, is legislation proposing a set of constitutional amendments, including the extension of the chief justice\u2019s term. A special parliamentary committee formed last month \u2014 which has …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":71859,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[75],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-top"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71843"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71843\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":71861,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71843\/revisions\/71861"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71859"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}