September 19, 2008	Friday	Ramazan 18, 1429

LAHORE, Sept 18: The Lahore Bar Association (LBA) at its pre-rally general house meeting on Thursday cancelled the membership of Attorney-General Latif Khan Khosa and banned his entry into the bar along with that of Law Minister Farooq H. Naek.

The step came in protest against what the lawyers call the pick-and-choose policy of the PPP government in offering fresh oath to the deposed judges instead of restoring them en bloc. Later, the LBA led a rally to the Post Master General (PMG) Chowk, where it staged a sit-in for 15 minutes.

Owing to Ramazan it did not join the colleagues at the Lahore High Court Bar Association which took out a separate rally, led by Supreme Court Bar Association President Aitzaz Ahsan. Mr Ahsan came to the general house meeting of the LHCBA unannounced and proposed making teams of young lawyers for running the campaign for Ali Ahmad Kurd for the presidential slot of the SCBA in the next election.

Mr Ahsan dubbed the election for the office of the SCBA president as the most crucial in the campaign for the restoration of the deposed judges. Later, he marched with lawyers to the Charing Cross in front of the Punjab Assembly building.

Workers of several political parties, including the PML-N, accompanied the lawyers. They held aloft their party flags and chanted slogans. Outside the assembly building, the protesters broke up into several groups and again raised slogans for the restoration of the deposed judges.

Earlier, the lawyers at the LHCBA meeting underlined the need to continue the movement and advanced arguments against what they called the impression that the movement had died down with the fresh oath to several deposed judges. “The judges, who have accepted a fresh oath, are full of regret. They would not get what they desired while accepting an offer that was contrary to the lawyers’ demand,” said Advocate Nisar Safdar.

He said it didn’t matter even if all the judges were to abandon the movement because it was tied with the emblem of the independence of judiciary, Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry.

Raja Shahzad Rathore said those who had left the movement were traitors and had joined those who themselves came after making compromises under the ‘criminal reconciliation ordinance’. He criticised the Pakistan Bar Council members who, he said, stabbed their colleagues in the back by opposing the campaign.

Former LHCBA president Hafiz Abdur Rehman Ansari said the young lawyers -- the driving force behind the campaign -- were not disheartened over departure of few judges. He criticised Attorney-General Sardar Latif Khosa for stating that even Asif Ali Zardari could not restore the judges, and warned him of cancellation of his membership.

He was all praise for Justice Sarmad Jalal Usmani’s wife who had opposed her husband’s move to accept the fresh oath of office.

Former Supreme Court Bar Association president Hamid Khan said the campaign for an independent judiciary could not fail because it was a battle between the right and the wrong. He added that the movement would pick up again after Ramazan.