Bangladesh News

The Supreme Court (SC) yesterday rejected the controversial appeal against the High Court (HC) directives for the Election Commission (EC) to collect and publish certain personal information about the aspirants to parliament.

The full bench Appellate Division headed by Chief Justice Mohammad Ruhul Amin in its ruling said the petition did not qualify as an appeal as it was filed on the basis of false and fabricated documents.

The judgment means now there is no bar to disclosure of eight-point details including academic qualification, profession, source of income, wealth accounts and criminal records (if any) of the candidates.

The HC passed the landmark order on May 24, 2005 following a writ petition filed as a public interest litigation by three lawyers–Abdul Momen Chowdhury, KM Zabir and Zahurul Islam.

Appearing for the original petitioners, Dr Kamal Hossain called for an investigation into how the HC verdict had been stayed in response to an appeal grounded in fabrication.

The SC in its judgment observed that “there has been no appeal in the eye of law” and the petition could not be considered an appeal since it “had been filed by fabricating papers.”

Expressing annoyance over the manner in which the appeal was filed, the chief justice said almost every sector has been ruined and dishonest people are now trying to destroy the top court too, said KM Zabir.

Despite the SC orders, Abu Safa, the appellant, was not present at the court while Nawab Ali, advocate-on-record for him, placed an affidavit explaining the absence.

The bench asked the advocate-on-record why Safa failed to appear in person. It also wanted to know whether he had ever met Safa.

The SC concluded that the reasons cited in the affidavit for the absence were not satisfactory. It said had the counsel for the appellant told the court about security concerns beforehand, it would have ordered for police protection.

The affidavit said Safa’s family was deeply concerned about the “misrepresentation, speculations, and exaggeration by the media”. They were particularly worried about his recently married daughter whose “life could be jeopardised by further misleading publicity.”

The court at one point remarked that Nawab Ali should consider quitting his job.

Earlier on November 20, the SC directed him to produce Safa and “state the facts from the stage of filing leave petition.” The same day it fixed the date for passing the judgment.

Lately, the EC had moved for quick disposal of the appeal as it looks to incorporate the provision of eight-point personal information in its electoral rules.

The appeal had remained pending since December 19 last year when Justice Joynul Abedin, the chamber judge, stayed the HC directives. The stay order came only a couple of days before the closing date for filing nomination papers for the January 22 general election, cancelled later.

A group of BNP-Jamaat alliance leaders and lawyers including former law minister Moudud Ahmed had worked to obtain the stay.

The original petition said the EC should ensure that the candidates cannot cheat the voters by their rhetoric. The constituents must be given access to personal information about the candidates so they could make the right choice.

AFFIDAVIT BY ADVOCATE-ON-RECORD
Nawab in the affidavit said he got to know Safa sometime in July 2005 when he came to his chamber.

Safa had studied up to class eight and still wanted to participate in parliament election as a social worker. But he feared he might face some kind of discrimination in the election if his educational qualification is published. And that is why he had decided to challenge the HC order.

The affidavit said locals of Swandip were of the opinion that sudden loss of a brother on November 27, 2006, might have influenced Safa to scrap his plan for election. It claimed he obtained nomination paper the same day his brother died.

According to the affidavit, Nawab sent his representative to Swandip to search for Safa following the SC orders but to no avail. Although in the same statement Nawab described Safa as someone from a respectable family.

The affidavit read, “Mr. Safa had been to Saudi Arabia and earned a decent living as a remittance earner and spent money in the area for social work.”

But lawyers and rights activists found out that Safa was not settled in Swandip and he did not even file nomination papers.

INFORMATION HC WANTS TO BE MADE PUBLIC
The HC had directed the EC to gather and publish information about prospective candidates’ academic qualifications (to be supported by certificates), and whether they are accused in any criminal cases at present or whether there were any criminal records in the past.

It also wanted the EC to collect details about profession and sources of income of the candidates.

The EC was asked also to know and publish whether a candidate had been a member of parliament before, and the role he/she had played individually and collectively in fulfilling the commitment made to the people.

Besides, the HC asked it to obtain information about the amount of loans taken by a candidate from banks and financial institutions (personally, jointly or in the name of dependents) or loans taken from a company of which the candidate is chairman or director.

Assets and liabilities of the candidates and their dependants should also be reported.