LAHORE, June 14: Pro-judiciary lawyers on Thursday dominated a crowded general house meeting of the Lahore High Court Bar Association convened to discuss a bribe scam involving real estate developer Malik Riaz and CJP’s son Dr Arsalan Iftikhar.
The LHCBA is presently led by the lawyers who are considered to be sympathetic towards the PPP-led government whenever it comes to a tussle between the government and Chief Justice of Pakistan Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry led judiciary. Bar’s present head Shehram Sarwar and other representatives were elected with the support of a group led by former Supreme Court Bar Association president Asma Jahangir.
As the general house meeting started, bar’s secretary general Sardar Akbar Ali Dogar invited a senior member and ANP leader Ehsan Wayne to address the house. A group of lawyers started chanting full-throated slogans when they observed Mr Wayne ‘criticising’ the chief justice of Pakistan.
The slogans in favour of the judiciary and against Malik Riaz and the government forced Mr Wayne to shorten his speech and leave the hall.
The lawyers did not allow any other speaker to address the house and demanded Shehram Sarwar should lead a lawyers’ rally in favour of the judiciary.
Initially the president opposed the demand and tried hard to keep the house in order. However, he failed to reign in the lawyers and had to lead a rally from the bar towards GPO Chowk.
The lawyers, after staging a demonstration at GPO Chowk for half an hour returned to the bar. However, bar’s secretary Dogar and few other members went to Aiwan-i-Adl to join the general house meeting of the Lahore Bar Association.
They later came back to the high court along with a rally taken out by the LBA members from Aiwan-i-Adl to GPO Chowk. The LBA members led by president Chaudhry Zulfiqar entered the high court chanting slogans in favour of the CJP and the judiciary.
They gathered at the bar’s compound and staged a demonstration against, what they said, conspiracy hatched to malign the judiciary.
On the occasion, Mr Zulfiqar announced holding of protest camps at LHCBA compound and Aiwan-i-Adl on a daily basis. He also announced taking out protest rallies every Thursday from the next week.
The LBA also cancelled bar membership of Advocate Zahid Bokhari, counsel for Malik Riaz, and banned his entry on the bar premises for indefinite period. It also carried a resolution and pledged its full support to the Supreme Court and announced two-day complete boycott of courts.
A resolution adopted by the bar said no lawyer would appear before any court on Thursday and Friday.
The Punjab Bar Council also gave a separate call for the two-day boycott.
Later, LHCBA office-bearers issued a press release stating the bar would firmly stand by the judiciary against every ‘conspiracy’. It said the lawyers had not launched the restoration movement for any individual but for the whole institution. The bar demanded that a high-level inquiry commission should be constituted to probe into the Arsalan-Riaz bribe scam.