The Chief Justice of Lahore High Court (LHC) Umar Ata Bandial on Friday disqualified Punjab’s former finance minister Rana Asif Mehmood, belonging to the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) over possession of dual nationality.
The PML-N lawmaker was accused of possessing Canadian citizenship along with his Pakistani nationality.
Rana Asif Mehmood was appointed as the provincial finance minister of Punjab this year but had resigned in June two days prior to the passage of the provincial budget over the issue of the dual nationality.
Mehmood’s resignation was demanded because he possessed dual nationality, PML-N sources had said whereas Mehmood had denied that he was asked by his party to resign.
Chief Justice LHC had suspended the lawmaker in August and stopped him from attending the Punjab Assembly session while issuing notices to all those party to the case.
Rana Asif’s membership was suspended on August 3 on petition filed by Faisal Ilyas Sadiq, whose counsel, Saiful Malook pleaded that the court should suspend the membership of Asif as he is a Canadian national, as a Article 63(1) C bars any person who is a dual nationality holder from representation in any legislature of the country.