Supreme Court subverts the Constitution. Again! – by Saad Mansoor

While the nation mourns the systematic murder of its minorities, there is another murder taking place in the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

A four member bench of Supreme Court has ruled that the Parliamentary Committee’s rejection of six additional judges of high court is void and ordered the Executive to issue notifications for appointing the same. So in essence Supreme Court has thrown aside the letter and spririt of the Consititional amendments done with pompous and fervor and illegally appropriated the sheer right of Parliament.

The Dawn reports:

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court on Friday outlawed the Parliamentary Committee’s rejection of extension to six high court judges and directed the government to issue appointment notifications to the rejected judges in accordance with the Judicial Commission’s recommendations, DawnNews reported.

The apex court issued the ruling after hearing petitions assailing the Parliamentary Committee’s decision of declining JC’s recommendations to extend the service tenure of the six judges.

Earlier, Dawn had learnt that the six judges who were denied extension by the Parliamentary Committee lost out because of their professional as well as personal shortcomings, as viewed by their respective chief justices.

A one-year extension was denied to four additional judges of the Lahore High Court (LHC) as well as two Sindh High Court (SHC) judges by the eight-member bipartisan committee. The committee based its decision on the assessments provided by the respective chief justices, which in turn were based on the judges’ conduct and character.

The LHC judges who were not granted extension were: Syed Mazhar Ali, Mohammad Yawar Ali, Mamun Rasheed and Muhammad Farrukh Irfan.

Moreover, the parliamentary committee had also refused to extend the service of SHC’s Justice Mohammad Tasneem and Justice Salman Hamid.

This order has disasterous implications as now the judges will be appointing judges, Chief (read Cheap) Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudry can give himself a life long extension and no one can stop him because he would simply pass a stay order against passing of any such legislation. If parliamentary committee rejects it, he will simply grant another stay order, ordering that the Parliamentary Committee’s decision is suspended and then void. While this exact logic was extensively discussed during the post 18th amendment discourse on media, the pro-Chief Justice groups dismissed it as the sheer paranoia of politicians, they were right in the respect that they thought no one can be so shameless in misusing the powers, let alone the exalted CJ.

While the Constitution prohibits stay orders against passing of legislations such stay order was given by the one of its kind, the standard bearer of (in)justice, (dis) honourable Justices of Lahore High Court when they de facto suspended the articles of Constitution by not only stopping the President from granting Asia Bibi a pardon but also stopping Sherry Rehman from proposing a legislation to amend the respective law. That is not only in violation of the Constitutional articles dictating rights of parliament but also the basic rights to freedom of expression.

This is not the first time that this lot of Supreme Court judges have thrown the Constitution asunder for sake of personal power. Another on going case where by lawfully appointed judges who had taken oath under the Provisional Constitution Order of 3rd November have been declared dysfunctional. Last month they were stopped from working and issuing orders where as executive was ordered to disobey any of their orders.

This was a repeat telecast of what happened three years ago when the Executive, the dictator Musharraf ordered a judge dysfunctional and stopped him from working, starting a chaos. Months later in a Supreme Court verdict it was ruled that there is no such thing as making a judge non-functional and there is no provision for the same in the Constitution. Also, that if a judge is accused of anything his case be referred to the Supreme Judicial Council and until that moment he remains a fully active and functional judge. Not doing so would be a manifest violation of the Constitution itself. So currently seven judges of high courts and supreme court have been barred from doing their Consitutional duties because Chief Justice of Pakistan so wishes. The legal thing of course would have been to let them work until the Supreme Judicial Council takes its decision.

The extensive proceedings on the 18th amendment while the appeal against 17th amendment remains unheard by the same judges, the consistent Supreme Court pressure to institute the cases against the President disregarding the Constitution, while no case against the golf course in Lahore, railway scandals, or the stay order government of Mian brothers is called for proceeding, while the Asghar Khan Petition gathers more dust and the judges and their cronies step up their witch hunt against the genuine political class of Pakistan, while the nation is befooled by a sham free media, the Constitution of Pakistan shortly after it’s rebirth less than a year back has been yet again, murdered in cold blood.

……..

Note: See comments section for notes on Justice Deedar Shah.

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