A total of three MPO orders have been nullified by the PHC.
All of the deputy commissioner’s directives issued on May 9 have been ruled illegal by the court in KP.
On Wednesday, the Peshawar High Court (PHC) ruled that the deputy commissioner’s orders to arrest protesters from May 9 under the Maintenance of Public Order (3 MPO) were illegal.
There had been an appeal to the high court on the 3 MPO law in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa (K-P).
Through the help of Advocate Ali Azim Afridi, Advocate Naeem Ahmed Khattak filed a writ case challenging the authority provided to district administrations in Section 3 of the Municipal and Provincial Organisation Act. The provincial administration was represented in the writ petition by the chief secretary and legal secretary. It was argued that the bill violates the constitution and is therefore incorrect.
The writ petition claims that under 3 MPO, any person may be detained without probable cause. It was also made clear that the administrative officials had the authority to issue, carry out, punish, and try those named on the warrants.
Afridi argued that despite the Supreme Court’s (SC) repeated rulings on the separation of powers, the judiciary has been stripped of any authority.
He remarked that under MPO, everyone is detained and thrown in jail without a trial or explanation.
As a result, the PHC contacted the K-P caretaker administration to inquire about the MPO arrests of Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) members.
K-P Advocate General Amir Javid, however, filed an objection to the court’s ability to consider the writ petitions, arguing that they were not timely because the provincial government had declared an emergency.
Justice Shakeel Ahmed and Justice Waqar Ahmed, sitting as a two-person bench in the Supreme Court, released their long-awaited verdict today.
Many PTI members and leaders were arrested after the May 9 attacks on state installations, but the court has now ruled that the provincial administration’s order to release them was unlawful.
The PHC also overturned the deputy commissioner’s order to have PTI employees arrested.
