LAHORE, Feb 18: The Supreme Court Bar Association announced on Tuesday that a countrywide movement would be launched from Feb 28 to protest against the extension in the retirement age of superior courts’ judges.

Speaking at a news conference, SCBA president Hamid Khan and other office-bearers said they would invite all parliamentary leaders to Islamabad on Feb 28. The issues pertaining to the Legal Framework Order and the three-year extension in superior courts’ judges retirement age would be presented before them.

“The Bar will observe black day on March 8 because the sitting chief justice of Pakistan was to retire on this date under the previous law. Now he will hold the office for another three years under the LFO,” they said.

The Bar would hold conventions on the LFO on March 22, April 17, May 8, May 27 and June 28 in Peshawar, Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad and Quetta, respectively.

They said black flags would be hoisted on the buildings of all the Bar associations in the country while the lawyers would wear black badges on March 8.

The SCBA officials said that the three-year extension in the retirement age of judges was an ill-gotten gain under the LFO which itself was an invalid law.

“This extension disabled the judiciary from examining the constitutional standing of the LFO since it had become a beneficiary to it after accepting the extension,” they said.

They urged all the judges to renounce the three-year extension. They appealed all judges who had passed the superannuation age prior to the enforcement of the amended law of retirement, to voluntarily seek retirement.

The SCBA officials further urged the judges to insist for an immediate oath under the constitution.

They said the LFO was an attempt to introduce arbitrary and self-serving changes in the constitution without presenting the amendments package before the elected representatives. “The SCBA urges parliament to consider the LFO as mere proposals for constitutional amendments. It should reject those portions which undermine the parliamentary form of government, process of presidential elections and independence of judiciary.”

A resolution of the SCBA regarding non-enforcement of the United Nations’ resolution on independence of judiciary had been forwarded to the UN, the office-bearers said.

They reiterated that no constitutional petition would be filed before the Supreme Court in protest against superior courts’ judges decision to accept three-year extension in their retirement age.

However, the members of the SCBA would continue to appear before these judges in the petitions filed in the public interest.

They said that the SCBA would hold a seminar on ‘Peace in Iraq - American violation on of UN charter and international law’ on March 1, in Islamabad. This would be followed by a peace march by the participants in the seminar. They also urged all the Bar associations in the country to observe peace day on March 1 to express solidarity with the people of Iraq.