Jan 11 , 2016
News
Bilalwal calls for wide ranging judicial reforms
PPP chief stresses poor-friendly judicial system, vows PPP will provide it to people
INPLAHORE - Pakistan People’s Party Chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Monday visited the Lahore High Court Bar Association and called for wide ranging judicial reforms.
Bilawal pleaded for revisiting the procedure for the appointment of judges, the setting up of a Constitution Court, regulating the use of suomoto powers, provision of speedy and inexpensive justice, legislation to prevent misuse of blasphemy law and ending the culture of sacred cows in fighting corruption.
During address to the Lahore High Court Bar Association covering issues in democracy, constitutionalism and rule of law, he also addressed issues in the National Action Plan describing it as “Noon League action plan” that had failed in stopping banned outfits from resurrecting under other names.
“I urge you to give a thought whether the independence of judiciary is guaranteed by vesting the power to appoint judges by the judges alone or is it best served when the power to appoint judges is diffused between the parliament, the president, the prime minister and the bar council?”, he asked the galaxy of lawyers present at the Bar address Monday morning.
He said the restoration of judiciary in March 2009 as a result of public demonstrations created some sort of euphoria that led some to believe that a new era of independent judiciary had dawned but some people thought otherwise, he said.
Bilawal said that during 2010-13 the Judicial Commission (JC) made 126 nominations of judges in the Supreme Court and the five high courts while the Parliamentary Committee (PC) disagreed with only eight appointments. However, the court overturned all the decisions of the PC.
He recalled that then president Asif Ali Zardari filed a constitutional reference seeking opinion on the roles of the JC, the PC and the president in the appointment of the judges and quoted from the verdict that the role of the president and the prime minister was no more than mere post offices.
He said that our failures were collective. “The politicians made mistakes, the establishment has made mistakes and the judiciary also has made huge mistakes”, he said recalling past judicial doctrines of “necessity”, or ‘a successful revolution creates its own justification’, the judicial murder of an elected prime minister and opposing judicial verdicts in cases involving a prime minister from Larkana and a prime minister from Lahore.
About the role of the parliament, he said that the constitution has clearly laid down the scheme of powers in which lawmaking is the responsibility of the parliament, the judiciary interprets the laws and the executive implements the laws and quoted articles from the constitution that laid special emphasis on the role of the parliament in constitution and law making.
Bilawal also called for the setting up of the Constitution Court with equal representation of all federating unites to decide constitutional issues saying that it was unfinished agenda of the Charter of Democracy signed in May 2006 between his mother Shaheed Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto and Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif on behalf of their parties.
Bilawal said that the court’s power to decide alone constitutional issues was an “awesome power”. If this awesome power is not exercised with great care and humility it can undermine the democratic process itself and easily become what many call a judicial tyranny, he said.
About the use of suomoto powers he said it would be worthwhile to make a comparative study of how many suomoto notices were taken in PPP government and how many after the PPP was no longer in power.
Quoting from the report of the International Commission of Jurists which visited Pakistan in 2011 which said that the use of suomoto led to a corrosion of the rule of law and a blurring of the constitutional separation of powers, Bilawal asked the lawyers to give a thought to whether there was need to regulate the suomoto powers. He said that he was happy that the Senate Committee of the Whole has also made some similar recommendations.
Stressing the need for access to speedy and inexpensive justice Bilawal called for a poor-friendly judicial system and vowed that the PPP will provide it to the people. Those who cannot secure their rights easily through recourse to law are actually oppressed by the law, he said. “In our system of courts, the broadest interface of the citizens with the law occurs in the subordinate courts,” he said.
Bilawal paid glowing tributes to the lawyers, the media and the people for the democratic struggle and ended his speech with a quote from the speech of his mother “I believe and the Pakistan Peoples’ Party believes with me that greatness lies within our grasp and a dream lies within our grasp, a dream that can best be nurtured in freedom, in law, in respect and in dignity”.
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk