PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court has directed the provincial governor, chief minister and other relevant officers to respond to a petition against the recent replacement of the chairman and members of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata) Tribunal, which was revived in 2023 for hearing certain cases under the repealed Frontier Crimes Regulation.

A bench consisting of Justice Ijaz Anwar and Justice Wiqar Ahmad granted the respondents a fortnight`s time to file comments about the petition filed by the removed tribunal chairman, Kifayatullah Khan, and members Khalilullah Khalil and Aminul Haq.

It allowed the petitioners to includenew chairman Syed Zaheerul Islam and members Mohammad Roshan and Shakirullah Afridi as respondents in the petition.

The respondents include the KP governor and chief minister through their principal secretaries, provincial chief secretary, its additional chief secretary (home) and secretaries of the law, finance and planning departments.

The provincial government had issued notifications on Nov 8, 2023, and Sept 4, 2023, appointing the three petitioners as the tribunal`s chairman and members for a period of three years.

However, the government de-notified the petitioners on June 16and appointed Syed Zaheerul Islam as the chairman and Mohammad Roshan and Shakirullah Afridi as members for three years.

The bench also fixed July 9 for hearing into a petition seeking interim relief of suspending the June 16 notification of the government.

The Fata Tribunal was revived on the order of the high court for hearing 11 of the cases referred by the court, including that of Dr Shakil Afridi, who wasimprisoned for his alleged links to a banned terrorist group. The cases had been pending since the tribunal became defunct with the repealing of FCR in 2018.

Besides those cases, the tribunal will also hear and decide other cases, remanded or referred by the high court or the Supreme Court.

On Dec 2, 2022, a three-member high court bench ordered the government to notify two defunct judicial forums under the repealed FCR including t he Fata Tribunal and commissioner FCR for hearing cases that originated under the regulation before its abolition.

Lawyers Malik Mohammad Ajmal Khan and Nasir Naeem Umerkhaili appeared for the petitioners and said that their clients had challenged the summary moved by the government for their replacement.

They, however, said after the petition was filed, the government de-notified the petitioners on June 16 and appointed their successors.

The counsel argued that the summary approved by the chief minister for de-notifying petitioners violatedthe relevant high court judgement and was `based on favouritism, tainted with malice and mala fide, and illegal.

They pointed out that the governor had returned the summary insisting the tribunal has yet not completed its notified tenure and that the summary doesn`t provide any `substantive justification for bringing its functioning to a premature close.

The lawyers added that the governor pointed out that while relevant provisions, particularly Section 55(3) of the FCR, do empower the competent authority to rescind or modify such appointments, the exercising of that power must have `clear, cogent and well-documented reasons.

They argued that the petitioners had been appointed chairman and members of the tribunal after due deliberation and that there was no reason available with the government to de-notify them.

The counsel insisted that the respondents had shown undue haste in moving the summary as it was forwarded on May 21 and circulated and signed by different respondents the same day.