LAHORE, November 8: Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) on Tuesday moved Lahore High Court (LHC) against the formation of an inquiry committee to probe Newsgate scandal.
The petition was filed by PAT leader Ishtiaq Chaudhry as he is of the view that committee chairman Justice (rted.) Aamer Raza is a close aide of Sharif family; hence, the present commission formed by the government cannot dispense justice.
It should be mentioned here that the government nominated Justice (R) Aamer Raza as head of the committee yesterday and members will include Provincial Ombudsman Punjab Najam Saeed, Secretary Establishment Syed Tahir Shahbaz, Director FIA Punjab Dr Usman Anwar and one representative each from Inter Services Intelligence, Military Intelligence and Intelligence Bureau, according to press release of Interior Ministry.
Last month, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif removed Information and Broadcasting Minister Pervaiz Rashid from his cabinet over October 6 security meeting’s leak to media. The article, published in “the newspaper”, caused uproar and the journalist who wrote it was briefly hit with a travel ban.
“The planted story related to NSC and NAP meetings published in Dawn onOctober 6 was a breach of national security. Evidence available so far points to a lapse on part of Information Minister, who has been directed to step down from office to enable holding of an independent and detailed inquiry,” a statement by PM office said.
Later, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had said that there is a consensus between the civilian and military leadership that whoever leaked the ‘false story’ should be exposed.
Briefing the media about Pervaiz Rashid’s suspension as information minister, Nisar said that on the basis of initial probe he can say that there is no record as to who leaked the story. Nisar said Pervez Rashid did not make any attempt to stop news story from being published.
“Pervez Rashid should have told the journalist concerned that the news is incorrect and this should not be published in the national interest… and upon resistance he could have asked, Zafar Abbas (the editor of the newspaper), not to run the story,” he said.-Agencies
