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| August 23, 2002 | Friday | Jamadi-us-Saani 13,1423 |
Judicial reforms plan hits snags
ISLAMABAD, Aug 22: The Asian Development Bank-funded judicial reforms project has run into snags as the judicial functionaries, especially those of the Lahore High Court, are not cooperating with the federal government.
It is learnt from the federal government officials that the ADB, which had released US $100 million in December, 2001, has withheld the next tranche of US $50 million which was due in June, 2002.
The ADB review mission is expected in the last week of August but is unlikely to okay the next tranche as only two out of seven conditionalities have been met so far.
The government had agreed that it would promulgate Freedom of Information Act, Defamation Law, Contempt of Court Law, Small Cause Courts, provide powers to the sessions judges to try habeas corpus petitions, change the status of the Law Commission to make policy for the judiciary and make amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code to ensure quick servicing of the process, and the Police Ordinance.
The government has so far promulgated Small Cause Courts and Police Ordinances and provided powers to the sessions judges to hear habeas corpus petition.
The government had committed to the ADB that it would promulgate the Freedom of Information Act, but there are no signs it would be done soon.
An official of the law ministry, where a monitoring cell, headed by a joint secretary, has been created, told Dawn that the ministry was unaware when the freedom of information law would be promulgated.
The sources said the judicial reforms project has been opposed mainly by the Lahore High Court Chief Justice Falak Sher who first took the position that Pakistan’s judiciary needed no foreign funds for reforms. He was also of the view that it would add to the Pakistan’s already huge foreign debt.
The federal government, however, accepted the soft-term loan. The sources said the LHC first asked the government to place the funds at its disposal and it would do reforms on its own.
When explained that under the procedure, funds would have to be handled by the provincial finance ministry as the judiciary was not trained in fund management, the provincial judiciary has started moving towards reforms, but at a slow pace.
The provincial judiciary was told to come up with definite plans for reducing delays, capacity building and also for the buildings which it wanted.
The official sources said that under the Access to Justice Programme (AJP), a pilot project on delay reduction was conducted in all the provinces. The results, he said, were so encouraging that the Karachi court showed an increase of 246 per cent in criminal dispositions by applying the methods which are to be enforced throughout the country.
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