April 01, 2007	Sunday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 12, 1428

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ISLAMABAD, March 31: People’s Party Parliamentarians secretary-general Jahangir Badar on Saturday said his party did not want to take control of the ongoing movement of lawyers, but at the same time it could not leave lawyers alone in their struggle for the independence of judiciary.

Talking to journalists after a meeting of the party’s think-tank at the residence of Abida Hussain, Mr Badar said it had been decided that the movement for the independence of judiciary would only be led by bar associations.

He rejected allegations that opposition parties wanted to hijack the lawyers’ movement after their failure to mobilise the masses. He said the PPP had decided to activate the People’s Lawyers Forum which would hold lawyers’ conventions in the four provinces. He said the PPP would also hold a seminar on democracy in Lahore on April 17.

Senator Latif Khosa, who is also a member of the Pakistan Bar Council, said lawyers would continue their struggle till restoration of the 1973 Constitution to its original shape.

He said the movement would not end even after restoration of Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry as the Chief Justice. He said the PBC had passed resolutions in this regard. He said the PBC had given a call for boycott of courts on April 3 when the Supreme Judicial Council would take up the reference against the chief justice.

Responding to a question about decisions taken by the party’s think-tank, Mr Badar said the decisions could not be made public without approval from party chairperson Benazir Bhutto. He said they would send the decisions to Ms Bhutto.

Punjab PPP president Makhdoom Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Raja Pervez Ashraf, information secretary Sherry Rehman, former ministers Aftab Shaaban Mirani and Sardar Assef Ahmed and other party leaders attended the meeting.

Meanwhile, Sherry Rehman told Dawn that the PPP had finalised a plan to hold a protest demonstration outside the Supreme Court building on April 3.