Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) has approached the Federal Constitutional Court over the imposition of governor’s rule and a state of emergency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, asking the court to review an order that has halted related cases before the Peshawar High Court.
PTI Chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan filed the petition on Thursday, seeking a review of the court’s order of November 5, 2026. The petition was filed through lawyers Shah Faisal Ilyas and Ali Zaman, according to reports of the filing.
The petition asks the court to make Gohar and the other petitioners parties to the proceedings, give them an opportunity to present their arguments, and allow them to file written submissions. It also asks the court to amend its November 5 order so that the Peshawar High Court can resume hearing and deciding the constitutional petitions already pending before it.
Those petitions challenge the imposition of emergency and governor’s rule in the province. The PTI argues that the November 5 order affected proceedings on those petitions, which were already before the high court when the order was passed.
The background to the case goes back to October 11, when President Asif Ali Zardari signed a summary, on the prime minister’s advice, to impose emergency and governor’s rule in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under Articles 232 and 234 of the Constitution. The federal government also transferred powers in the province to Governor Faisal Karim Kundi.
On November 5, the Federal Constitutional Court issued an order on petitions filed by the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government, suspending proceedings on constitutional petitions filed on or after October 12 in the context of the deployment of armed forces under Article 245 to assist the civil administration. Following that order, the Peshawar High Court did not schedule hearings on the petitions challenging governor’s rule and the emergency, and it later removed around 105 petitions from its November 10 cause lists, including those challenging the emergency and governor’s rule and those seeking the recovery of detained leaders. The high court directed the petitioners to approach the constitutional court instead.
The PTI petition also seeks the release of Chief Minister Sohail Afridi and provincial assembly Speaker Babar Saleem Swati through the cases challenging the emergency and governor’s rule. Afridi has not been seen in public since the Centre imposed governor’s rule and emergency on October 11, and a federal minister confirmed the next day that he and some of his cabinet members were in preventive custody.
In a separate filing on the same day, PTI lawmaker Shandana Gulzar approached the Federal Constitutional Court seeking the immediate release of Afridi, Swati, party provincial president Junaid Akbar and other party workers. Her petition asked the court to direct the respondents to disclose the whereabouts of the detained leaders and workers, the authority exercising custody, the legal provisions invoked, and the grounds and circumstances of their detention.
The opposition alliance Tehreek-e-Tahafuz-e-Aayen Pakistan had announced a day earlier that it planned to approach the Federal Constitutional Court against the suspension of hearings in cases registered under governor’s rule, emergency and the Maintenance of Public Order. The matter now rests with the Federal Constitutional Court, which will decide whether the high court can resume hearing the pending challenges.
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