PESHAWAR: The lawyers have rejected amendments to the Code of Civil Procedure and provincial narcotics law and warned that if the government didn’t withdraw those changes, they would agitate across the province.

During a news conference at the Peshawar Press Club, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council announced a complete boycott of court proceedings across the province on Dec 9, 10 and 11.

PBC vice-chairman Sher Mohammad Khan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council vice-chairman Saeed Khan and Peshawar High Court Bar Association president Abdul Lateef Afridi said the amendments to the CCP and narcotics law would complicate the relevant legal process.

They criticised the government for not increasing the number of judges to the people’s misery.

Warn they will agitate if amendments to CCP, drug law not withdrawn

The leaders of lawyers said there would a complete boycott of the proceedings of courts from Dec 9 to Dec 11.

Earlier, the KPBC met with the participants unanimously adopting a resolution, which declared the amendments to the CCP a violation of the people’s basic rights.

They warned that the legal community would resist the enforcement of those changes.

The members of lawyer organisations, who also attended the meeting, criticised the government for amending CCP ‘in haste and without taking them on board’.

They said the lawyers would continue with the protest until the government didn’t accept their demands.

The lawyers said amendments to the CCP and provincial drug law went against the basic constitutional rights of the people and that they would not only overburden the high court but also create problems for litigants.

They said the poor litigants would have bear additional expenses in case amendments were not reversed.

The lawyers said the new law would also deny the people the right to easy justice.

They urged the government to amend laws only after consulting stakeholders.

The lawyers said they would take to the streets to create public awareness against the amended law.

They said the residents of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa had suffered a lot due to militancy, so the government should stop creating more problems for them by making unnecessary amendments to laws.

The lawyers said they won’t allow such experimentation.

Members of the legal fraternity had boycotted courts across the province on Friday against amendments to the laws in question.

Published in Dawn, December 8th, 2019