Supreme Court issues contempt of court notice to MQM’s Altaf Hussain

The Supreme Court has served a contempt notice to Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) Chief Altaf Hussain over his recent telephonic address to his party workers in Karachi.

A three-member bench presided by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry issued the contempt of court notice under Article 204 of the Constitution and Section 3 of the Contempt of Court law.

The court was hearing the case pertaining to the implementation of recommendations given by the Supreme Court in the Karachi unrest case last year.

The court directed Pakistan Electronic Media Regularity Authority (PEMRA) to submit the record of Altaf Hussain’s speech. MQM Chief Altaf Hussain and the Deputy Convener of the party’s Rabita Committee Dr Farooq Sattar, who is also a Member of National Assembly (MNA), were summoned by the court on Jan 7.

The chief justice said that the speech given by Altaf Hussain after the delimitation order was not only contemptuous but also held a note of threat. “Is it now expected of us to not even do our job?” inquired the chief justice, adding that the bench working for peace in Karachi was criticized.

He said the speech had contained unnecessary criticism and unnecessary allegations against the judges.

During his address over SC ruling on delimitation of new constituencies in Karachi on December 2, Altaf Hussain called the court’s remarks  unconstitutional  and  undemocratic, adding that the Supreme Court does not have the authority to say that constituencies should be formed in such a way that a single-party majority does not exist.

The MQM, which is the ruling party in Karachi, has several constituencies that are considered to be key strongholds. During his address, Hussain also claimed the observation was a well thought out plan to break the MQM’s majority mandate and speculated that this would spark ethnic discord.

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Posted by Web Desk on Dec 14 2012. Filed under Latest News, National, Pakistan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.