ISLAMABAD: Justice Umar Ata Bandial was sworn in as Pakistan’s new Supreme Court chief justice on Wednesday at a ceremony attended by top civilian and military leaders, diplomats and foreign dignitaries.
President Dr. Arif Alvi administered the oath to the country’s top judge before an audience that included Prime Minister Imran Khan, Chief of Army Staff General Qamar Javed Bajwa and other top civil and military officials.
Justice Bandial will continue as the chief justice till his retirement in September 2023.
A day earlier, on the eve of the outgoing Chief Justice Gulzar Ahmed retirement ceremony, Justice Bandial in his address to a full-court reference said the “growing pendency of cases remains one of the main issues facing this court.”
Justice Bandial said that to overcome the challenge of pendency of cases, the judiciary needs the cooperation of the Bar in two ways “firstly, to save the court’s time there should be greater reliance on written briefs, concize statements and skeleton arguments by counsel that obviate the need for copious notes and for counsel to end the culture of seeking adjournments at the time of hearing.”
“Secondly, the Bar must lend its support for adding capacity to the Court for the elevation of Hon’ble Judges to the Supreme Court whose seniority, honesty, competency, judicial temperament are accompanied with the diversity of experience suited to the nature of work that needs disposal,” Justice Bandial said in his address.
In 1983, Justice Umar was enrolled as an Advocate of the Lahore High Court and some years later, as an Advocate of the Supreme Court of Pakistan.
“In his law practice at Lahore Justice Umar Ata Bandial dealt mostly with commercial, banking, tax and property matters. From 1993 until his elevation, Justice Umar Ata Bandial also handled international commercial disputes,” his introduction on the official Supreme Court website read.
“He appeared in arbitration matters before the Supreme Court of Pakistan and also before international arbitral tribunals in London and Paris,” according to the text available on the website.
During his career as a Judge of the Lahore High Court and the Supreme Court of Pakistan, Justice Bandial has rendered judgments on a number of important public law and private law issues.
“These include pronouncements on civil and commercial disputes, Constitutional rights and public interest matters,” the Supreme Court said.
Umar Ata Bandial sworn in as Pakistan’s new chief justice
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Umar Ata Bandial sworn in as Pakistan’s new chief justice
- Growing pendency of cases remains one of the main issues facing the apex court – Justice Bandial said a day earlier in his address
- Justice Bandial will continue as the chief justice till his retirement on September 2023.
Rating firm S&P says it won’t rush Iran war downgrades, sees risks for countries like Pakistan
- Agency says it is monitoring indebted energy importers as higher oil prices strain finances
- Gulf economies seen better placed to weather shock, though Bahrain flagged as vulnerable
LONDON: S&P Global said it would not make any knee-jerk sovereign rating cuts following the outbreak of war in the Middle East, but warned on Thursday that soaring oil and gas prices were putting a number of already cash-strapped countries at risk.
The firm’s top analysts said in a webinar that the conflict, which has involved US and Israeli strikes against Iran and Iranian strikes against Israel, US bases and Gulf states, was now moving from a low- to moderate-risk scenario.
Most Gulf countries had enough fiscal buffers, however, to weather the crisis for a while, with more lowly rated Bahrain the only clear exception.
Qatar’s banking sector could also struggle if there were significant deposit outflows in reaction to the conflict, although there was no evidence of such strains at the moment, they said.
“We don’t want to jump the gun and just say things are bad,” S&P’s head global sovereign analyst, Roberto Sifon-Arevalo, said.
The longer the crisis was prolonged, though, “the more difficult it is going to be,” he added.
Sifon-Arevalo said Asia was the second-most exposed region, due to many of its countries being significant Gulf oil and gas importers.
India, Thailand and Indonesia have relatively lower reserves of oil, while the region also had already heavily indebted countries such as Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka whose finances would be further hurt by rising energy prices.
“We are closely monitoring these (countries) to see how the credit stories evolve,” Sifon-Arevalo said.
