ISLAMABAD    -   Chief Justice of Pakistan Jus­tice Umar Ata Bandial Monday said that the judges are not economists, therefore, would not interfere in the economic affairs as they did not have the required expertise.

A three-member bench of the apex court headed by Chief Justice Umar Ata Bandial and comprising Justice Ayesha Malik and Justice Athar Minal­lah conducted hearing of the petition of Jamaat-e-Islami for declaring the privatization of Karachi Electric Supply Com­pany as unlawful.

During the hearing, the Chief Justice asked the petitioner’s counsel to approach the con­cerned high court regarding the matter. 

Rasheed A Rizvi informed that the Parliament made two laws related to clause 3 of Ar­ticle 184 of the Constitution, which states that for the court to have original jurisdiction on an issue, it first needs to be of public importance and must involve a violation of funda­mental rights enshrined with­in the Constitution.

Justice Bandial also ques­tioned that if old cases were scheduled for hearings so the issue could be observed ‘live’. Jamaat-e-Islami in 2015 had filed an application against the privatization of K-Electric.

Advocate Salahuddin men­tioned that an application had emerged against the KSC Labour Union, however, Jus­tice Ayesha Malik stated that the matter was not before the court at the present time.

The petitioner’s lawyer ar­gued that the hearing should be adjourned till next week. However, the Chief Justice maintained that the court would be on holiday from next week and judges would not be available. He there­fore, asked the lawyer to re­ceive instructions before the next hearing. The apex court issued notices to all parties, including the gov­ernment, attorney general and K-Electric. The court noted that it had been eighteen years since the privatization of the pow­er utility. Later, the bench de­ferred the hearing of the case till today. K-Electric, formerly known as Karachi Electric Supply Cor­poration (KESC), was privatised in 2005 for a sum of Rs16 bil­lion to a Saudi-Kuwaiti group. In those days, the US dollar was val­ued at Rs59.75 in the inter-bank market. Going by those rates, the company was privatised for $270 million. The general perception was that privatisation will im­prove the financial condition of the company. In 2009, the compa­ny was sold to private equity firm Abraj Group with management control for Rs361 million.