Naveed Ahmad Khan
ISLAMABAD: The Special Parliamentary Committee on Tuesday recommended Justice Yahya Afridi’s name to be the next chief justice of Pakistan (CJP).
Incumbent CJP Qazi Faez Isa is set to retire on October 25, 2024 and will be replaced by Justice Yahya Afridi, who is third in the seniority list.
The Special Parliamentary Committee, formed after the 26th constitutional amendment, held its meeting with nine out of 12 members in attendance to deliberate the three names for a top judge slot.
Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s (PML-N) Senator Azam Nazir Tarar, Khawaja Asif, Ahsan Iqbal, and Shaista Pervaiz; Pakistan People’s Party’s (PPP) Farooq H Naek, Raja Pervaiz Ashraf, and Syed Naveed Qamar; Rana Ansar of Muttahida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) and Senator Kamran Murtaza of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) attended the meeting.
Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s Barrister Gohar Ali Khan, Barrister Ali Zafar, and SIC chief Sahibzada Hamid Raza abstained from the meeting.
The committee also deliberated on the names of Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, Justice Munib Akhtar.
How CJP is appointed after 26th constitutional amendment?
The constitutional amendment to Article 175A paved the way for key changes to how judges are appointed, shifting more authority to a 12-member parliamentary committee – comprised of eight members from the National Assembly (NA) and four senators – to appoint the CJP, selecting from among the three most senior judges.
After amendment to clause 3 of Article 175A, the top judge is now appointed on the recommendation of the Special Parliamentary Committee from amongst the three most senior SC judges, rather than the president designating the most senior judge of the Supreme Court as the CJP.
After finalising the name, the prime minister conveys the nominee’s name to the president for appointment after receiving it from the committee established for the same purpose.
Justice Yahya Afridi was born on January 23, 1965, in Dera Ghazi Khan. He received his early education at Aitchison College, Lahore, and later graduated from Government College, Lahore. He furthered his legal studies, earning an LLM from Jesus College, Cambridge University. He commenced his legal practice in 1990, eventually joining the Supreme Court bar in 2004. His judicial career began with his appointment as an additional judge of the Peshawar High Court in 2010, becoming a permanent judge in 2012. He rose to the position of Chief Justice of the Peshawar High Court in 2016. Justice Afridi’s appointment to the Supreme Court followed in 2018. Since then, he has participated in larger benches hearing significant cases, including those related to reserved seats and the Zulfikar Ali Bhutto presidential reference. He has also written dissenting notes in several key judgments.