Qazi Faez Isa

Qazi Faez Isa was born on October 26, 1959, in Quetta, Balochistan, the son of Qazi Mohammad Isa, a key lieutenant of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah during the Pakistan Movement. Isa completed his schooling in Quetta and Karachi before studying law in London, where he was called to the Bar of England and Wales at the Middle Temple. Returning to Pakistan, he practiced law for over 27 years before the High Courts and Supreme Court, acquiring a reputation as a preeminent constitutional and corporate advocate.

In 2009, following the restoration of the judiciary after the Lawyers' Movement, Isa was appointed Chief Justice of the High Court of Balochistan, where he rebuilt the provincial judiciary from the ground up. Elevated to the Supreme Court of Pakistan in 2014, he authored historic rulings, notably the 2019 Faizabad sit-in judgment, which reaffirmed constitutional boundaries for military intelligence agencies and protected fundamental rights of speech and assembly. Despite facing executive references and harassment, he was completely exonerated by the Supreme Court. Assuming office as the 29th Chief Justice of Pakistan in September 2023, Isa immediately made Supreme Court full court hearings accessible to the public via live television broadcasts, upheld the Supreme Court (Practice and Procedure) Act to dilute unilateral Chief Justice powers, and presided over the historic review declaring the execution of former Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto a miscarriage of justice.