Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry disappoints Dr Shahid Masood, Shaheen Sehbai and other democracy haters. “We won’t let system derail”: CJP
ISLAMABAD: The government filed a petition in the Supreme Court on Thursday, contending that any decision on the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) outside the scope of what the challengers had sought could destabilise the democratic system.
After remaining silent for four days, the government filed the petition through its newly appointed counsel Kamal Azfar to present its view on how the slightest mishandling could have repercussions for the entire system.
‘Pakistan today is poised at the crossroads. One road leads to a truly federal democratic welfare state with a balance of power among an independent judiciary, a duly elected government representing the will of the people and a determined executive which is fighting the war against terrorism and poverty,’ said the 12-page petition.
The second road leads to destabilisation of the rule of law, it said. ‘The people of Pakistan await your verdict,’ the petition contended, stressing that certain issues had been raised for the first time during the hearing which were not part of the petitions or the prayer and, therefore, contrary to the settled law enunciated by the court that arguments be confined to legal issues.
Acting Attorney General Shah Khawar repeated the government’s stance that it was not defending the NRO ‘from its inception till end’.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry made it clear that the court was also a supporter of the system. ‘We are telling everyone loud and clear that we are not going to derail the system.’
‘We had to hear many things after our July 31 judgment in which we supported the system,’ the chief justice said. ‘We would not be transgressing from the job assigned to us.’
Advocate Ibrahim Satti, representing Fazal Ahmed Jat, an officer of the Federal Investigation Agency facing a NAB reference, was the only counsel who supported the NRO because, he contended, it was not a bad law and its benefit should also be extended to his client.
‘If the ordinance is declared valid by this court and its benefit is extended even to a single person then my client is also entitled,’ he argued, saying it was a valid piece of legislation and did not impinge on any fundamental right.
He said every effort should be made to save the law instead of destroying it, an observation made by the court in numerous judgments.
The atmosphere became tense when the counsel, on a query by Justice Chaudhry Ijaz Ahmed, said the bench was hearing one-sided arguments against the NRO and his endeavour would be to change ‘what mind has been made up by the court’.
‘Where is the fault of ours if the government is not defending the NRO,’ Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday observed.
The chief justice clarified that the bench had not made up its mind and he still had no idea about the fate of the ordinance.
‘This is not the way to reply. I am a down-to-earth man and am not bothered about my judgeship,’ Justice Ijaz observed. He said he had also said so while leaving the office on Nov 2, 2007, (a day before all the judges were sacked by former president Pervez Musharraf).
‘God Almighty will save me and I am even ready now to quit the bench,’ he said.
‘I will withdraw my petition if the lordship is offended,’ Advocate Satti said.
Both apologised to each other and Justice Ijaz said he would be the last person to have malice against anyone.
ISLAMABAD: The petitions challenging the NRO will be decided in line with the provisions of the constitution and the law, but the system will not be allowed to derail, Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry said on Thursday. Heading a 17-member larger bench of the Supreme Court hearing challenges against the legality of the NRO, the chief justice also praised the government for opposing the 17th Amendment. But at the same time, he said the law and ethics could not be separated. He said under the principle of distribution of powers, the NRO was forwarded to parliament. Concluding his arguments, Abdul Hafeez Pirzada – representing one of the petitioners, Dr Mubashar Hasan – said that the rights of Pakistanis had been violated through the NRO, and the document, therefore, deserved to be declared void ab initio. He said the SC – in its July 31 verdict against the developments of November 3, 2007 – has already set aside amendment to Article 270AAA of the constitution, and it would now have to decide whether the NRO was ever a valid law. masood rehman
Source
(Nazir Naji)
Comments
There has been a critical error on this website.
Some examples of disappointment shown by the pro-Taliban and pro-Dr Shahid Masood group: (from pkpolitics)
ConcernedAmericanPak said:
This is if and only if, our Judiciary fails to bring the NRO’d and corrupt to the core people to their right full place, jail, including the Tax cheats and foreign deal makers.
My friends and foe’s, if you please put-on your thinking caps and think of Martial Law as one of the solutions for the country of Pakistan, a limited martial law, like the Bangladesh model.
Please review the descriptions of the Martial law and see that if our judiciary failed to get this criminally insane and a forced setup by the Neo-Satans of American war machine, out of the office the only alternative other than the a prolonged civil war, which is going on in Pakistan.
Anyone of you can identify the current situation to justify a limited martial law, just for a test, not the best alternative.
Martial law – is a system of rules that take effect if the military takes control of the normal administration of justice.
It is sometimes imposed in response to civic emergencies or episodes of unrest or riots, or during wars or in cases of occupations in “the absence of any other civil government.”
We have the episodes of unrest, riots, people being burnet alive, and are at war, with the Indian’s Afghans agents, American military, internal separatist movements and the insurgents. We are currently occupied by a gang of foreign agents and the dule citzens in the government with the tacit help from US war mongers and the British Raj and their resident agents , like Altaf the serial killer. We absolutely have no civil government, the country has been run by ethnic and family mafia bosses run gangs , such as MQM, PPPP, ANP, PML-N.
Examples of this form of military rule include Germany and Japan after World War II or the American South during the early stages of Reconstruction. In addition, it is used by governments to enforce their rule – for example, after a coup d’état (Thailand 2006); when threatened by popular protests (Tiananmen Square protests of 1989); or to suppress the opposition (Poland in 1981).
Another example would be The October Crisis which took place in Canada in October 1970. Martial law can be declared in cases of major natural disasters also; however most countries use a different legal construct, such as a “state of emergency”.
The October Crisis
A radical Quebec group raises the stakes on separation and Ottawa invokes the War Measures Act
http://history.cbc.ca/history/?MIval=EpisContent&series_id=1&episode_id=16&chapter_id=1&page_id=4&lang=E
runaway said:
Dissappointed
It seems the Supreme Court is going to miss the oppurtunity to cleanse the system instead it will not derail the system.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry made it clear that the court was also a supporter of the system. ‘We are telling everyone loud and clear that we are not going to derail the system.’
‘We had to hear many things after our July 31 judgment in which we supported the system,’ the chief justice said. ‘We would not be transgressing from the job assigned to us.’
Dawn:Govt urges SC not to go beyond NRO pleas
http://www.dawn.com/wps/wcm/connect/dawn-content-library/dawn/news/pakistan/12-govt+urges+sc+not+to+go+beyond+nro+pleas–bi-06
From the same newspaper i.e. The News International – Jang Group of Newspapers:
Anti-Asif Zardari malice exposed Saturday, December 12, 2009 By Fasihur Rehman
http://www.thenews. com.pk/daily_ detail.asp? id=212970
Is democracy all about a plethora of documents whose authenticity remains doubtful for more than 13 years now, on many counts and in the backdrop of the PML-N Quaid’s own statement that the accountability process was wrong and that it was initiated against Benazir Bhutto on others’ instigation.
This startling disclosure and the 11-year-long incarceration of President Asif Ali Zardari in cases that remained unsubstantiated in the courts give a benefit of doubt to the two main victims of this so-called accountability process bulldozed by Sharif’s confidant, Saifur Rehman of the Ehtesab (Accountability) Bureau. But what to talk of exoneration in media trials or malicious campaigns, certain quarters are unwilling to give even this benefit of doubt to President Zardari and his deceased spouse in sheer disregard for the undeniable fact that their party is still the biggest repository of the majority votes of the people of Pakistan.
Isn’t all this indicative of some elements’ unflinching war on Bhuttos and Zardaris or on the most popular democratic party, the Pakistan People’s Party, that they are trying all the workable and imaginary options to subdue democracy under documentary machinations.
Yes, they were democratic machinations and nothing more than that. It was none other than the high-profile and dependable figure of Mian Nawaz Sharif who blew the gaff during his interview to renowned journalist Suhail Waraich whose book is very much available at national and international bookshops. In this interview, while pronouncing the accountability process, ie Saifur Rehman’s accountability process, as wrong, Mian Nawaz Sharif has unequivocally stated that they (the Sharifs and the PML-N) were pushed to do so. To quote Sharif further, “there was pressure on us from the armed forces and the ISI. We were made to take such steps, by design, so as to deal a big blow to the politicians’ credibility.”
Now, these disclosures amount to serious undercurrents that have gone a long way to malign Mohtarama Benazir Bhutto and her spouse, Asif Ali Zardari. And everyone within the legal fraternity and even in the intelligentsia knows fully well that under the rules of natural justice or under the laws in force in majority of advanced, successful democracies, any case instituted under pressure or with negative designs, is deemed a case of mala fide intentions and is, thus, liable to be struck down by the courts. But that was an era when even the judicial forums have been conducting their affairs in a strange manner. On one day, Bhutto and Zardari would be ordered to appear in a Rawalpindi court and on the next day, they would be directed to appear in Karachi. This in itself speaks volumes of the anti-Bhutto and anti-Zardari conspiracies that would be pursued for years (rather for more than a decade) with ‘enthusiasm’ and exceptional shrewdness. Dates of appearance would be stage-managed, prosecutors would be given specific advice and material and the entire might of the governmental machinery and agency networks would be employed to make sure that Bhutto and Zardari remain in prison, if not as convicts, then as under-trials.
A study of Bhutto and Zardari cases reveals that they were case of poor, inadequate and questionable evidence, still these two leaders have been subjected to treatment that not even convicts of heinous offences would be meted out.Is this justice? Is this democracy? And how far is it justified highlighting heaps of rubbish again and again and projecting it as documents of incriminating evidence?
The fact is the same that Nawaz Sharif has already been exposed as a leader committed sincerely to the cause of democracy. It is unfortunate that cases sans evidence were instituted during his tenure, but it is heartening that he (Nawaz Sharif) has revealed the truth without any fear or reluctance.
Just have a look at some other words of Nawaz Sharif in the same interview. Sharif says: “I was not in favour of arresting Benazir Bhutto, but Saifur Rehman would insist upon her arrest. Ch Shujaat Hussain is witness to this fact that I wanted Benazir Bhutto to go abroad before being sentenced. In fact, I never wanted her to go to jail.”
Exposing other follies and foibles of Saifur Rehman, Nawaz Sharif further revealed that Saifur Rehman was the main mover behind the move that was aimed at getting 14 journalists dismissed from service.
This interview suffices to reveal the malice involved in the indictment of Bhutto and Zardari that led to the preparation of heaps of (questionable) evidence. But to democracy’s sheer bad luck, those heaps are being given too much display as if with the only objective of derailing the democratic system once again despite the fact that it (the democratic set-up) has come into being with the blessings of the masses.
It also reveals the under-the-table functions and structures whose guns are directed at the PPP. Now, the time has come for the national institutions, which stand transformed under clean personalities like Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry and COAS General Ashfaq Parvaz Kayani, to come forward and hit at these anti-Pakistan and anti-democracy moves with the power of the people entrusted through public confidence in these institutions. Otherwise, allow us for fighting yet another war that is against these sustained moves, against democracy and against the people of Pakistan.
Interestingly, during Thursday’s proceedings, Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had to ask various counsel deposing before the bench to confine themselves to arguments about the constitutionality of the NRO, the issue before the bench, and not to stray into other areas. In reply to the federation’s plea that the country is poised at a crossroads, one road leading to a federal democratic welfare state with a balance of power among legislature, executive and judiciary while the other leads to destabilisation of the rule of law, the Chief Justice made it clear that the SC was also a supporter of the system. As though to underline his view, the Chief Justice emphatically said, “We are telling everyone loud and clear that we are not going to derail the system.” The Chief Justice went on to clarify that the SC was not concerned in this case with the fate of individuals, and had only requested the lists of NRO beneficiaries in order to provide a basis for the case.
With the exception of one pleader, the NRO has been reduced to an orphan, with no defenders, and some arguing that it be declared void ab initio. Without meaning to anticipate the SC, it does not appear likely that the NRO will survive the battering it has received in this case. It is not only likely to be struck down, but may well be expunged as in violation of the constitution altogether. If the NRO is all but a settled matter, what remains to be focused on?
The sense of the SC bench will have disappointed the self-anointed warriors who were hoping that the NRO case would spell the doom of the present government and president, if not the democratic dispensation entire. With hindsight, it could be argued that they completely misread the law, the present conjuncture, and the perceptions, concerns and considerations of all the major players in the life and politics of the country. Admittedly these warriors were few, but they exercised, at least for a time, an influence far in excess of what they merited. If they seem to be falling flat on their faces, it is because the stakeholders in the system recognise not only the critical juncture at which the country stands poised, but also the need for all political forces and institutions of state to pull together and in the same direction of continuity, patience with our democracy still in infancy (once again), and in unity to face the serious challenges facing us, first and foremost the ongoing struggle against terrorism. Let that be a lesson for all would-be Platos already tested and any that may still be lurking in the wings.
http://dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2009\12\12\story_12-12-2009_pg3_1