The Lahore High Court (LHC) on Thursday disposed of a petition challenging Punjab Governor Balighur Rehman’s de-notification of Chief Minister Parvez Elahi after the former withdrew his order and accepted the validity of a vote of confidence taken late last night.
Last month, Elahi had challenged the governor’s orders, stressing they were illegal. The LHC had granted his a reprieve, suspending the orders, but barring him from dissolving the Punjab Assembly while the case was pending. During today’s hearing, Elahi’s counsel Ali Zafar informed the court that his client had taken the vote of confidence and secured the necessary 186 votes. This was also validated by the governor’s counsel, Mansoor Usman Awan, who urged the five-member bench to make the assembly proceedings part of the court’s record.
Zafar, however, said that while his petition had become ineffective after the vote of confidence, he still wished to argue against the governor’s notification as a “matter of principle,” maintaining that it was not legal. In response, the court said that if Zafar was contesting the legality of the governor’s order, then the entire matter would need to be examined, as there were three questions before the bench. The first question, said the judges, was of the vote of confidence; the second pertained to how much time was required to take the vote; and the third was on whether a chief minister could be de-notified if they failed to take a vote of confidence.
The governor’s lawyer, however, said that his client had accepted the vote of confidence and was withdrawing the de-notification order. “You have resolved the matter within the assembly; this is a good thing. Everything has happened according to the law and Constitution,” remarked Justice Abid Aziz Shaikh after hearing the governor’s lawyer. He said the court desired minimum intervention in such matters.
The court then made the lawyer’s statement part of the record and ruled that the chief minister had successfully passed the floor test, before disposing of the petition.
Elahi was retained as the chief minister of Punjab in a vote of confidence late last night where he secured the minimum 186 votes necessary to remain in his post. The opposition has alleged miscounting, but has yet to file any formal legal challenge to the proceedings.