Dual Offices: OK to Military, No to Civilians

In another attempt to further demolish the democratic rule in Pakistan, the Lahore High Court has issued a notice to President Asif Ali Zardari about the role of his dual offices of President of the country and co-chairmanship of the Pakistan People’s Party.

Sadly, the same was not the case when Pervez Musharraf and a number of other military dictators ruled the country in lawlessness for nearly 40 years collectively as the same judges at that time allowed him to sit in the Presidency with uniform.

What seems to be surprising is that all this is happening in a matter of a few days. After the revelation of Arsalan Ifthikar’s corruption case by real estate Malik Riaz Hussain and the direct knowledge of Chief Justice Ifthikar Muhammad Chaudhry, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani was disqualified within a two minute ruling on baseless charges of contempt of court.

It seemed like the higher judiciary hastily tried to divert the nation’s attention from a wide corruption case of the Chief Justice’s son towards the disqualified Prime Minister, which is definitely something that has denied the Supreme Court of all its credibility.

The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973, commands that all institutions of the country work towards strengthening the democratic setup, but it seems like dictatorship has taken a new form from military uniform to the black robes of the judges.

One question is that how can the Lahore High Court even think about summoning the President? There is no such law and on the other hand, the high court has gone to the extent of accepting petitions for hearings which include going against the President’s immunity and dual offices.

At the moment, Pakistan is again stuck in an unfortunate constitutional crisis as one institution that seems to have finally gone forever from the corridors of power, allowing another one to step in and dictate the civilian representatives.

What the disqualification of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani has resulted in is a precedent that judges of the higher courts are able to do anything they like without facing any consequences. From hanging out first democratically elected Prime Minister to now firing him without any constitutional basis just goes to show how maligned the judiciary has become.

Seeing how the disqualification of Yousaf Raza Gillani did not overturn the entire system, President Zardari has become their new target and cases against him are being accepted by our ‘honourable’ judges on a high priority basis.

The situation is without a doubt getting scary as it might result in another coup if the judiciary does not show restraint and stay within its limits, or else the people of Pakistan just might have to go through another dark era just when we were about to reach the end of the tunnel.

Short URL: https://www.newspakistan.pk/?p=27321

Posted by Syed Hassan Bokhari on Jun 28 2012. Filed under Editorial, Opinion, Pakistan, Politics. 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.