ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court (SC) declared on Wednesday that Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the founder of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), did not receive a fair trial during the hearing of the presidential reference concerning his death sentence.
Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa, while delivering the court’s concise ruling, stated, “We found that the fair trial and due process standards were not met.”
The decision by the court arrives almost 12 years after former President and PPP Co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari submitted a presidential reference aiming to review the sentence and execution of the PPP founder and former Prime Minister.
Bhutto was executed on April 4, 1979, following a Supreme Court verdict in a murder case labeled by his party as a “judicial murder.”
The reference, lodged by Zardari on April 2, 2011, under Article 186 of the Constitution, was taken up by a larger bench of the Supreme Court headed by former Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, which conducted five hearings of the reference.
On December 12, 2023, the reference hearing resumed under a nine-member bench led by CJP Isa following a decision to expedite a case under the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act, 2023.
The Supreme Court had appointed legal experts as amicus curiae to provide insights, particularly on the issue of the reference’s maintainability, pending for 11 years.
Besides CJP Isa, the bench comprised Justice Sardar Tariq Masood, Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Yahya Afridi, Justice Aminuddin Khan, Justice Jamal Khan Mandokhail, Justice Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Justice Hassan Azhar Rizvi, and Justice Musarat Hillai.
After hearing all arguments, the bench had reserved its opinion earlier in the week.
During today’s hearing, CJP Isa announced that the bench reached a unanimous decision.
Reading out the concise ruling, the chief justice emphasized the court’s commitment to justice without fear or favor and the importance of acknowledging past mistakes with humility.
He further explained that the presidential reference allowed reflection on the trial, conviction, and death sentence of Bhutto during the regime of military dictator Gen Zia ul Haq.
CJP Isa then read out the questions raised in the reference, addressing each with the court’s opinion, affirming that Bhutto’s trial did not meet the constitutional requirements of a fair trial and due process.
(Islamabad51_Newsdesk)
