ISLAMABAD, March 7: Lawyers of the country would observe a “black day” on Saturday to protest against the amendments made to the Constitution through the Legal Framework Order, and urge the judges of the superior courts to return the “dubious gift” of a three-year extension in their retirement age.
The lawyers community has selected March 8 purposefully as the sitting Chief Justice Shaikh Riaz Ahmad is set to attain the retirement age on the day under the 1973 Constitution. The bar would ask him not to accept the three-year extension given to judges by the military regime.
The Action Committee constituted by the National Conference of Lawyers Representatives from all over the country has given the call.
The lawyers have announced that black flags would be hoisted over buildings of all the bar associations. They would wear black badges and hold protest meetings on their respective bar premises.
They would also observe a token strike by abstaining from appearing before the courts from 11am to 12 noon, the same day.
Pakistan Bar Council, the apex body of the lawyers community, has written letters to three judges, who have attained the age of superannuation but are continuing in their office, to lay the robes honourably to avert a Constitutional crisis.
The legal practitioners are of the view that extension in the retirement age of judges has undermined the independence and credibility of the judiciary.
In a recent resolution, the PBC said: “In the opinion of the Council, it is an ill-gotten gain received from an illegitimate regime.”
The PBC is also demanding constitution of a high-powered parliamentary commission to examine the judgments which the judiciary delivered over the last three years.
The PBC, along with other legal bodies, have taken a stand that raising any issue of constitutional importance before the judiciary, with its present composition, was an exercise in futility, as Pakistan’s judiciary “has ceased to be independent.”
