KARACHI, July 30: No country can progress in the real sense without the supremacy of its constitution, the rule of law and the independence of judiciary, deposed chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry told lawyers at the Sindh High Court Bar Association here on Wednesday.
Speaking after unveiling a plaque naming the SHCBA bar room after him, he exhorted the lawyers to remain united and continue their struggle to attain the three objectives.
Referring to Tuesday’s State Bank report, he said the government had to resort to heavy borrowing because there was no investment. The economy, in turn, was not attracting investment because of continued judicial turmoil. There were protest rallies and slogans of ‘zindabad’ and ‘murdabad’ every now and then that kept the investors away.
The deposed CJ’s speech was frequently punctuated by vociferous slogans in favour of the deposed judges and the lawyers leading the movement and against President Pervez Musharraf and PPP leader Asif Ali Zardari.
The meeting was also addressed by SHCBA president Rasheed A. Razvi and Secretary Munirur Rehman, deposed SHC chief justice Sabihuddin Ahmed, Supreme Court Bar Association president Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan, Pakistan Bar Council member Hamid Khan, Peshawar High Court deposed chief justice Tariq Pervez, deposed justice Khwaja Mohammad Sharif of the Lahore High Court and LHC Bar Association president Anwar Kamal.
Deposed SHC judges Sarmad Jalal Osmany, Mushir Alam, Maqbool Baqar, Gulzar Ahmed and Athar Saeed, Pakistan Bar Council member Yasin Khan Azad, Karachi Bar Association president Mahmoodul Hasan and a large number of representatives from the various bar councils and associations were present.
Referring to suo motu exercise of the Supreme Court’s human rights jurisdiction, Justice Iftikhar said it helped solve many a problem faced by the people, particularly the poorer segments. That was why the country’s poor came from afar to greet him. They believed that only the judiciary could help them get justice. Besides the cases of Mukhtaran Mai and Munno Bheel, he referred to the deceased professor Ghazi Jukhio’s case wherein the court prescribed a time-frame for finalisation of pension cases without hassle.
About 30 million voters, the deposed CJ recalled, were registered as voters following a Supreme Court decision in a petition moved by the late PPP leader Benazir Bhutto.
He also referred to Justice Mohammad Haleem’s order setting aside the condition of identity card for eligibility as a voter and upholding the right of political parties to contest polls and choose a symbol in the late 1980s as the judiciary’s contribution to political process. Pakistan, he said, was created by a lawyer and now the people have united behind lawyers to ensure the rule of law. Condoling the ‘untimely’ death of Pakistan Bar Council member Imdad Awan, who was driving his car on his arrival at the Karachi airport, he suggested that a reference should be held for him. The Islamabad district bar, he said, had raised a monument to the martyrs of the lawyers’ movement. The Karachi lawyers may also follow suit and build a monument for Raja Riaz, Altaf Abbasi and other lawyers killed on May 12 last year and on April 9 this year. The name of Imdad Awan should also be mentioned among the martyrs, he said.
JUSTICE SABIHUDDIN: Deposed SHC chief justice Sabihuddin Ahmed said the judges who declined to take oath under the November 3, 2007, provisional constitution order remained united. Their refusal to take a fresh oath was a conscious decision and they were proud of it. The rumours that some of them were now prepared to be administered a new oath were calculated to breach their unity and resolve.
Such reports, he said, amounted to character assassination, ‘which must stop’. Nobody has a right to doubt the integrity of the deposed judges, he added.
Justice Tariq Pervez said the struggle for independence of the judiciary was, in fact, a struggle to save Pakistan. Justice Khwaja Sharif said the judiciary had paid the debt it owed to the nation and it was now for the latter to compel the ruling party to redeem its solemn commitments, particularly the Murree Declaration.
RASHEED RAZVI: SHCBA president and vice-chairman of the PBC executive committee Rasheed Razvi said the deposed CJ’s visit to Karachi had ended the ‘atmosphere of fear’ that hung over the city after the May 12 mayhem. The lawyers’ struggle has always been peaceful and if there was any violence, it was injected from outside. The oath of office sworn by holders of public office was a covenant with the nation and not with the person administering the oath, he said.
AITZAZ AHSAN: SCBA president Aitzaz Ahsan warned that ‘the parliament is on its way out’ and regretted that there would be no independent judiciary to save it. Independence of the judiciary, he said, preceded the introduction of democracy. Citing Britain’s example, he said Lord Cook instituted the writ of habeas corpus against the crown much before universal suffrage was introduced in 1920. About Federal Law Minister Farooq Naek’s invitation to the deposed judges to take a fresh oath, he said a new oath would amount to validation of the Nov 3, 2007, emergency that decimated the judiciary. As a PPP member, he said, he was committed to the restoration of the judiciary as the late Benazir Bhutto had promised reinstatement of the deposed chief justice.
Praising unity among lawyers, he, however, asked them to maintain discipline in their ranks. He told the slogan-chanting lawyers near the dais to hearken to their representatives’ calls. Just before he suffered a heart attack, he recalled, Imdad Awan had a heated argument with the lawyers sitting on the deposed CJ’s car and pressing it from either side, as a result of which two tires of the vehicle were punctured.
HAMID KHAN: PBC member Hamid Khan said the PPP’s constitutional package was an attempt to weaken the judiciary. It was meant only to protect the so-called National Reconciliation Ordinance. He warned that lawyers like Farooq Naek, Latif Khosa and Babar Awan could not override the collective will of the legal fraternity and the people at large. Success was in sight and the present set-up would not last long, he said.
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