Friday, September 25, 2009

Farooq Hamid Naek, Chairman Senate of Pakistan

Farooq Hamid Naek (also spelled Farooq H. Naik) is the current Chairman of the Senate of Pakistan, who replaced Muhammad Mian Soomro on 12 March, 2009.He was appointed to that position by President Asif Ali Zardari of the ruling coalition of PPP, ANP, MQM and JUI-F. As a result of his election, senior PPP leader Raza Rabbani resigned from the position of Leader of the House. Before being appointed Chairman, Naek was the Minister of Law and Justice in the federal government since 31 March, 2008, but will have to let go of the ministry because of the new appointment.

Farooq H. Naek received an MA in Economics from University of Karachi and LLB from Sindh Muslim Law College. He is a career lawyer who served as Assistant Director, Directorate of Labour and Social Welfare, Government of Sindh in 1971. He then was a Civil Judge and First Class Magistrate from 1971 to 1975. He also served as Deputy Attorney General of Pakistan from 1994 to 1996 in the second Benazir Bhutto government.

Naek enrolled as Advocate of local court in 1970, advocate of high court in 1976, and of Supreme Court in 1990. He resigned from the judicial service after serving as civil judge for two years and became an active member of the PPP in the mid-1970's.

Although, Naek was actively associated with the PPP for three decades, he never shot into prominence and earned the limelight only when he fought the corruption and criminal cases against Benazir Bhutto and Asif Ali Zardari during Pervez Musharraf's rule in and out of Pakistan. It was during these extremely difficult years of Mr. Zardari that Naek earned his trust. Before and after becoming the President of Pakistan, Zardari always consulted him on legal matters and other issues.

He later became a Senator from Karachi, Sindh in 2003 for a period of six years.
(Source: Wikipedia)