Supreme Court seeks government’s written reply over sacking army chief, DG ISI petition

At a time when there have been signs of defrost in the frosty ties between military and civilian leadership, the Supreme Court directed the government to submit a written reply within two weeks that it has no intention of dismissing the army and ISI chiefs.

A three member bench of the Supreme Court, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, heard the petition, seeking to stop any attempt by the government to remove the Chief of Army Staff General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani and Director General ISI (Inter Services Intelligence) Ahmed Shuja Pasha in filing replies with the court in the controversial memogate scandal.

Maulvi Anwarul Haq, the Attorney General of Pakistan has assured the court that the government did not have any plan to remove the top brass of the army, quoting recent statement of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani.

The Attorney General also spoke up about maintainability of the petition, saying it was prepared based on the conjectures and media reports. However, the Chief Justice ruled over the objections claiming, “That’s why we have issued you notice. The country needs improvement in the state of affairs”.

The verdict by the bench is evocative of a parallel pledge sought by the Supreme Court in October 2010 following media reports that the government was planning to undo the March 16, 2009 notification of restoring the superior court judges dismissed by former president Pervez Musharraf.

Despite the premier had given assurance in the National Assembly that he had no mind of withdrawing the executive order, the law ministry was directed to comply with the direction.

The petitioner claimed that the government couldn’t remove the army and ISI chiefs after it gave extensions to the top slots to the military. Analysts believe that whey the government cannot curtail the extended tenures when it is empowered to give extension.

In the present scenario, the government is not in position to do so when the tensions between civil and military relations after the memogate scandal have not so well. But the apex court would not have ideally entertained the petition that bent upon creating confusion when the country is already faced with the miscellaneous scam.

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Posted by Faisal Farooq on Jan 23 2012. Filed under National, Pakistan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.