Zulfikar Bhutto’s death sentence: PPP chairman Bilawal moves SC for live streaming of proceedings

Islamabad, December 11

Pakistan People’s Party chairman and ex-foreign minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Monday approached the Supreme Court for live streaming of proceedings on a case seeking to revisit the controversial death sentence given to the party founder and former premier Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.

“The reference was filed by the then president of Pakistan namely Asif Ali Zardari, who is the father of the present applicant,” the plea said.

In March 1978, a four-member bench of Lahore High Court had given death sentence to Bhutto, which was later challenged in the Supreme Court.

In a four to three split verdict, a seven-judge apex court bench upheld the sentence during the military regime of the then-army chief Gen Ziaul Haq in March 1979.

A nine-member larger bench of the apex court will commence on Tuesday the long-pending presidential case seeking to revisit the death sentence given to Bhutto.

The case was filed on behalf of former president Asif Ali Zardari on April 2, 2011, to seek an opinion on revisiting the death sentence given to the former premier under the Supreme Court’s advisory jurisdiction.

Headed by Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa, the larger bench will consist of Justices Sardar Tariq Masood, Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Yahya Afridi, Amin-ud-Din Khan, Jamal Khan Mandokhel, Muhammad Ali Mazhar, Syed Hasan Azhar Rizvi and Musarrat Hilali.

On Monday, Bilawal, through his lawyer Farooq H Naek, filed a petition in the top court requesting that the hearing of the case should be “live/on-air” so that the entire country could hear it, Dawn newspaper reported.

“The reference was filed by the then president of Pakistan namely Asif Ali Zardari, who is the father of the present applicant. Hence, the applicant is the son of Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and the grandson of Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, who was the founder of the PPP and a great leader of unprecedented scale, calibre, and character,” the plea said.

It stated Bhutto was “charged, convicted of conspiracy to commit murder, sentenced and executed on the testimony of an approver in the greatest miscarriage of justice that was ever to befall this country.”

“It is in order to remove this stain and correct the wrong in history that the applicant has preferred the instant reference to bring on record the reality of the life of his grandfather. Hence, the applicant wants that the hearing of this case, should be live/on-air, so that the whole Pakistan can hear it and this would be transparent for everyone,” the application said.

It subsequently prayed that permission be granted for the live broadcast of the said reference, which will be heard tomorrow. “This would meet the ends of justice,” the plea added.

Talking to the media in Islamabad, Bilawal said those who had died could not be brought back but said he expected justice from the courts to “correct the past”.

Addressing a convention of the PPP workers in Kohat, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, on Sunday, Bilwal said that his party expected “justice” to be served in the case.

“We had this hope from Chief Justice of Pakistan Qazi Faez Isa that he would avail the opportunity to wash the blood off from his institutions and his court that was […] involved and an enabler in this tragedy.”

“He should correct the constitutional and legal mistakes which were made (by the apex court),” he was quoted as saying by the Dawn newspaper.

“We expect justice,” Bilawal said.