Adil Najam
In a rather shocking move, the President, Gen. Perzez Musharraf just dismissed the current Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry for alleged “misuse of authority.”
According to a breaking news segment at The News:
The president has submitted a case against Chaudhry to the Supreme Judicial Council. Musharraf had received “numerous complaints and serious allegations for misconduct, misuse of authority and actions prejudicial to the dignity of office of the chief justice of Pakistan,” and Chaudhry had been unable to give a satisfactory explanation, sources said. The report did not specify what he was accused of. The council is a panel of top Pakistani judges that adjudicates cases brought against serving judges and will decide whether the charges against Chaudhry merit his formal dismissal and whether he should be prosecuted.
Basing their story on the Associated Press of Pakistan, the BBC reports further:
Mr Chaudhry was summoned to explain himself to Gen Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz. His case was then referred to the Supreme Judicial Council which will decide if Mr Chaudhry should be prosecuted.
The move has shocked many, but signs of its coming can now be identified in hindsight. Mr. Chaudhry had served as the Chief Justice since 2005 and, on occasion, had taken steps that had irked the power structure in Pakistan.
According to a Khaleej Times report, for example:
Last June, the Supreme Court rejected a government move to sell 75 percent of state-owned Pakistan Steel Mills to a Saudi-Russian-Pakistani consortium for 21.7 billion rupees ($362 million). Mill workers claimed it was greatly undervalued. Also, Chaudhry has heard a landmark case brought by relatives of dozens of people believed taken into secret custody by Pakistani intelligence agencies. The chief justice has pressed the government to provide information on the detainees whereabouts. Talat Masood, a political analyst, said the removal of Chaudhry demonstrated the power of the military and suggested that Musharraf’s government wanted to have a “pliable judiciary” ahead of parliamentary elections expected later this year. Musharraf, who took power in a bloodless coup in 1999, is widely expected to seek another five-year term as president from parliament this fall.
Recently, an open letter from Advocate Naeem Bokhari addressed to the Chief Justice and making a number of allegations against him – some personal – has been circulating on the internet extensively. Over the last week, I received probably two dozen emails with that letter in it (many from our readers, and one from my mother!). It seems to have created a stir. Many readers have been writing that we do a post on that letter. I had not done so, just because the letter was a little puzzling to me and its motivations were not clear. I wondered also if there were hints of personal rivalries or issues. On the other hand it was a well-written and seemingly sincere letter from a person of known integrity. In retrospect, the way the letter ended was prophetic:
My Lord, this communication may anger you and you are in any case prone to get angry in a flash, but do reflect upon it. Perhaps you are not cognizant of what your brother judges feel and say about you. My Lord, before a rebellion arises among your brother judges (as in the case of Mr. Justice Sajjad Ali Shah), before the Bar stands up collectively and before the entire matter is placed before the Supreme Judicial Council, there may be time to change and make amends. I hope you have the wisdom and courage to make these amends and restore serenity, calm, compassion, patience and justice tempered with mercy to my Supreme Court. My Lord, we all live in the womb of time and are judged, both by the present and by history. The judgement about you, being rendered in the present, is adverse in the extreme.
In all honesty, one has to wonder, however, whether it was that letter and other recent media focus on the Chief Justice that led to the removal of the Chief Justice, or whether these were merely instruments designed to prepare the way for this removal?
In either case, a removal of the Chief Justice in this way and for such reasons and at this time is a sad, sad development that will be one more blow to the hopes of the development of an independent judiciary in Pakistan.
Note: At various points we have reproduced, in our right-most column, cartoons from Daily Times (and here) and The News.
The Link Newspaper March 23
Text from Qur’an;
“Oyou who have attained unto faith! Be ever steadfast in upholding justice; bearing witness to the truth for the sake of God, even though it be against your own self or your parents and kinsfolk. Whether the person be rich or poor. God’s claim takes precedence over the claims of either of them. Do not then follow your desires lest you swerve from justice for, if you distort the truth, behold God is indeed aware of all that you do” {4:135), and Justice God will definitely do “even if it were an atom’s weight”
We cannot keep going from one judicial crisis to another. SOme way has to be found to make the judiciary really independent. Once that happens a lot of others things will get fixed themselves.
After trampling down every democratic institution in Pakistan under his military boots, General Pervaiz Musharif turned his guns towards the last bastion of civil liberties in Pakistan i.e. Supreme Court of Pakistan. After failing to intimidate Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Choudary to resign he then suspended him on false and flimsy accusations. We need to remember he is the same Chief Justice who ruled privatization of Pakistan Steel Mills as illegal. He is the same Chief Justice who directed the government trace disappearance of people by secret agencies of Pakistan.
This could be very important juncture in the political history of Pakistan where judiciary has a dark history of following military orders by providing military rulers ‘legal justifications’ for their unconstitutional acts by legal creativeness of “doctrine of necessityâ€
babbi, a relative of ours did business with defense Purchase (DGDP). He was so tired of Generals/Brig/Col’s demands and commissions. Most of the top brass demands their commissions overseas in Western banks. The money was mostly used by the generals wife’s and children traveling and buying properties abroad.
The guy ultimately died of heart failure. He lived in absolute pressure all his life and cursed the day he started this line of business. He died at age 48
Finally, the Army has found the only corrupt person in Pakistan, ITS CJ.
Corruption always trickle from the top. Who on the earth is going to put reference against these brigadiers and generals having lots and lots of property and bulging bank accounts.
You can ask the people involved in Military supplies, the percentage of comission that is demanded by these Army officials.