But there seems to be a consensus that the Supreme Court’s order to reopen cases against President Zardari in courts outside Pakistan was against Article 248 (2). We are no legal experts and would not dwell on the subject but quote a renowned lawyer and constitutional expert, Aitzaz Ahsan, who stated that President Asif Ali Zardari has the immunity against any criminal or other offence till the time he holds this office. …

Apart from the PPP leaders, some participants and analysts in talk shows on almost every news oriented channel demand the opening of pending cases regarding Mehran Gate scam, whereby politicians had received enormous sums when the Islami Jamhoori Ittehad (IJI) was cobbled together and pitted against the PPP in the general elections. Air Marshal (retd) Asghar Khan had filed a petition in this regard in the apex court when Sajjad Ali Shah was the chief justice of Pakistan. At one hearing, former Army Chief Aslam Beg also appeared before the court but since then this particular case has not been reopened. According to media reports, Hudabia Mills case is pending in which Ishaq Dar of the PML-N had given a confessional statement about the remittances of millions of dollars belonging to Mian Nawaz Sharif.

Chairperson of the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP), Asma Jahangir, said that “while, the NRO can never be defended even on the plea of keeping the system intact, the Supreme Court’s judgement has wider political implications. It may not, in the long run, uproot corruption from Pakistan but will make the apex court highly controversial….The judgement has also sanctified the constitutional provisions of a dictator that placed a sword over the heads of the parliamentarians. Moreover, it has used the principle of ‘closed and past transactions’ selectively.”

In an interview on a private TV channel, Dr Ayesha Siddiqa said that the establishment stands to gain from the stand-off between the judiciary and the legislature. She implied that the judgement on the NRO was delivered at the establishment’s behest. She agreed in principle that action should be taken against the corrupt but the time and the environment was not right. But one could ask her a question: when the armed forces are fighting the war in FATA and elsewhere against the misguided elements, terrorists and also fighting an alien’s proxy war, is this the correct environment and the correct time for an onslaught against the armed forces? One would not hold brief for any of the military adventurers in the past that abrogated the Constitution, but nobody in his or her right sense would like to see a weak Pakistan without vigilant intelligence agencies and strong armed forces.

Except the beneficiaries of the NRO, the entire nation has appreciated the Supreme Court’s verdict declaring it unconstitutional. People have described the judgement as a historic one; in the past the judiciary never had the courage and the will to put the higher echelons of bureaucracy, ministers and the big and mighty in the dock. The apex court has directed the reopening of all the cases withdrawn under the Ordinance both inside the country and abroad with immediate effect. It is within the judiciary’s right to move the courts to decide the pending cases and, if convicted, to disqualify the members of the assemblies from their seats. But the print and the electronic media — with their newfound freedom — showed utter disregard to the Supreme Court’s order that till the matter is sub judice they should not comment. They continued with their comments and the media trials of the beneficiaries of the NRO, thus creating an embarrassment for the judiciary.

One media group has arrogated itself the role of a kingmaker and spews venom against the president and the PPP leaders. Since the cases are with the court, there should be no media scrutiny; otherwise it will give rise to polarisation in society, which the country cannot afford at present.

Unfortunately, the judiciary’s role in Pakistan has not been very commendable in the past. In 1954, Governor General Malik Ghulam Muhammad, sick in mind and body, had dismissed the constituent assembly because of his contempt for democratic polity. He did not want to be answerable to anybody. The federal court had upheld his action under the law of necessity, thus paving the way for others to follow suit. In 1958, 1977 and 1999, the military overthrew elected governments, abrogated the Constitution once and put it in abeyance on the other two occasions. In 1988, 1990, 1993 and 1996, the president of Pakistan armed with 58-2 (b) dismissed the National Assembly, and with it the prime minister in 1988, 1990, 1993, and 1996. The Supreme Court validated all of these actions except the Assembly’s dismissal in 1993. John G Roberts, the present Chief Justice of the US, declared in 2005: “Umpires do not make the rules. They apply them. The role of an umpire and a judge is critical. They make sure everybody plays by the rules. But it is a limited role. Nobody ever went to a ballgame to see the umpire.” Having said all the above, Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry is committed to giving the nation a clean, efficient and independent judiciary. It is hoped that he would start cleansing the lower judiciary where citizens have the first encounter with the judges in their quest to seek justice.

http://dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009\12\23\story_23-12-2009_pg3_5

The Supreme Court’s verdict on the NRO was certainly an unprecedented event.

However, the night the verdict was announced, every famous TV anchor was jumping and hyperventilating; some almost foamed at the mouth as if struck by a strange, sudden bout of happiness.
What is this, I thought? Have we won Kashmir? Have we triumphed in the war against the Taliban? Or have we finally eradicated poverty, illiteracy and hatred from Pakistan?

I mean, I have never seen these anchors sound so excited. Not even during Musharraf’s resignation, and when the Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudry was reinstated. Indeed, the like TV anchors were grinning (and rightly so) during these two episodes, but I wondered, exactly why such a show of overwhelming exhilaration over this particular event?

But, then, of course, I thought. What better reason and time than now to put peddle to the metal against the electronic media’s favourite punching bags: Asif Ali Zardari and Altaf Hussain. Never mind what ever happened to the pending case that Asghar Khan had submitted in the courts against the ISI’s blatant misdoings while constructing a superficial front against the PPP in the rickety shape of the IJI. Just stick to Zardari. Because the individual in Pakistan is always bigger (and more venerable) than the whole. Easy to understand, castigated and got rid of.

As more and more former judges continued to burst the anchors’ euphoric bubbles that day by suggesting calm, and saying that the matters of the court were just too technical and complex to rush to any glorious conclusions, the anchors eventually went all upright. The ‘technical talk’ in this respect that the anchors were already somewhat struggling with, suddenly turned moralistic. After all, peachiness becomes the refuge of the politically biased, or of men unconvincingly trying to communicate an air of objectivity.

Within hours of the verdict when the former judges failed to say what the anchors were hoping them to, the word ‘akhlaq’ (morality) cropped up. In a brazen display of utter subjectivity, many of such anchors did not hesitate to float the idea that the president and those ministers whose names were on the NRO beneficiary list, should resign on ‘moral grounds.’

First of all, these anchors can easily find themselves in glasshouses when it comes to matters like aqhlaq. We have all seen how much of this aqhlaq is present in their talk shows on which folks have been known to start sounding like right-wing anarchists who are willing to mutilate and sacrifice the presidency, democracy and parliament at the altar of unsubstantiated accusations and assorted reactionary claptrap.

Secondly, such anchors were openly lamenting the constitutional clause that protects the president from facing the courts, and I am sure many of their equally disappointed viewers must also be lamenting the fact that there was no manly military dictator at the helm who could flick aside the constitution, like Ziaul Haq, who is on record as saying: ‘What is a constitution? Nothing but just a piece of paper.’

Innocent until proven guilty. What’s so complicated about that? And couple this with the obvious political nature of the many ‘corruption’ and ‘criminal’ cases against the PPP and MQM leaders, let the honourable courts decide who is guilty or not.

Who are we to point fingers? Who are we to cast the first stone? And all this rap about akhlaq; for heaven’s sake, forget about the high and the mighty, how many of us educated, middle-class folks can call ourselves spotless? Take a small example: How many of us are willing to show any decency to, say, a lowly paid traffic cop? How many of us do not have that instinctive thought of bribing our way out of a traffic violation, or out of any other crime (petty or otherwise)?

This most certainly is not a defence of corrupt politicians. It is a plea to look at the system. A system that each one of us — from the so-called feudal and upper-middle classes all the way to the middle-class — benefit from. We bribe, break the law, lie, cheat, all in the name of survival, and then when guilt strikes, we select our favourite punching bags in the shape of elected politicians and bash them, all the while remaining quiet for years when ruled by an unconstitutional military dictator; or even when men who blow themselves up in public live and plot in our neighbourhoods. There is little or no hue and cry then.

On the other end, sometimes this guilt leaves us suddenly rediscovering God and religion. Then it’s back to going on a rampage of punching venerable scapegoats, this time in the name of faith. Thus, I believe, in this country it is hypocrisy that is the major cause of corruption. So stop thinking that it’s democracy that is to be blamed.

Remember East Pakistan? No uniformed strong man or a mard-i-momin can save a country as diverse as ours. Stop getting lost in the middle-class fantasies of powerful men and glorious conquests. Vote, and then wait to vote out whom you do not like. Stop falling prey to fascist escapades dressed as patriotism, uprightness and worst of all, akhlaq.

Waltz with the NRO
Nadeem F. Paracha
Sunday, 27 Dec, 2009
http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/the-newspaper/columnists/nadeem-f-paracha-waltz-with-the-nro-729