March
16 , 2007
Desperate
Measures
There
are times in life and country that desperate
measures are needed. And like raising
children it is vital that the punishment
fit the crime. More importantly, the
means to that end acquire even greater
gravity.
One morning in America we awoke to the
shock of the Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, being
made non-functional by a military head
of state, for allegations of abuse of
power. Article 209 of the constitution
was invoked and the matter was referred
to the Supreme Judicial Council, which
shall sit in judgment on March 13th,
2007.
About three weeks prior an open letter
to the Chief Justice by Advocate Naeem
Bokhari made the rounds on the Internet,
in which the theme of abuse of power
and passion for protocol were repeated
in each paragraph. And now another complainant
from Peshawar has joined the media trial
against the Chief Justice.
Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry took
oath in 2005 and was tenured to 2013.
Reports prior to and after his suspension
confirm that he worked at an unprecedented
rate and whittled down the immense backlog
of cases in the Supreme Court. He was
particularly partial to human and women’s
rights and the environment. He ruled
on the merit of the case and not the
respondents, causing deep embarrassment
and exposure to the government in the
case of the privatization of the Pakistan
Steel Mills and the allotment of plots
in Gwadar. The proverbial last straw
was his handling of the missing persons’
case, in which he demanded a list from
the government as well as their production,
for it appears that the government was
making them go missing.
Now we all have our quirks. He liked
being escorted by a motorcade of police.
But was that grandiosity or caution?
Judges have been killed multiple times
in Pakistan, two in recent memory. The
president of the United States has two
decoy planes, Musharraf travels with
three Mercedes decoy cars, the mortal
threat to them being quite obvious.
Handing down decisions in which 50%
of the time one party is very unhappy
raises the stakes and the threat to
the Chief Justice.
He flew in an official plane to a couple
of events and wanted a wing of a rest
house for his own use alone. People
were deferential to his son, because
dad was the Chief Justice. So? If fair
comparison is made, even in contemporaneous
times, the Chief Justice would not take
the prize for corruption; he would probably
trail the list. If principle is adhered
to then it must be applied across the
board. How appropriate is it for the
Prime Minister of Pakistan to hold permanent
residence of the United States, and
the allegiance to another nation that
that status implies? Is it principled
to engineer a trip to the United States
just so that one can preen in the honor
of being the first prime minister of
Pakistan to open the New York Stock
Exchange? Is it fair for Musharraf to
promote his book and make the rounds
of talk shows in the United States on
government expense? How appropriate
is it for the then Prime Minister Chaudhry
Shujaat Hussain to go for umra at governmental
expense and tag along a multitude of
in-laws? On a dollars and cents level,
these foreign adventures of the accusers
of the Chief Justice break the back
of the taxpayer, police motorcades and
rest house wings are a pittance in comparison.
Government spokesmen parroting the line
that the non-functionality of the Chief
Justice was done in a constitutional
manner does not make it correct. It
is sad that Goebbels’ philosophy
is used so often in Pakistan: that you
repeat something often enough and it
becomes the truth, even to you. According
to the said article 209 the matter is
to be referred to the Supreme Judicial
Council and only after the SJC has reviewed,
investigated and ruled against him,
is the judge to be made non-functional.
Government spokesmen are busy orchestrating
a media trial and then have the bravado
to say that lawyers and former justices
should not interview with the media
as the issue is sub judice.
And now for the desperate measures.
One wonders why the legal advisers to
Musharraf are sleeping on the job. If
nothing else they might have informed
him of protocol and constitutional constraints.
The President cannot demand to see the
Chief Justice. He cannot read him the
allegations and warrant an explanation.
And horror of horrors, send police cars
to chase him down so that he does not
get to his office and then condemn him
to house arrest. No meeting privileges,
even with fellow justices, no cell phone
or even land line privileges, no television
service, no newspapers, impounding of
his cars and having domestic servants
deposit their cell phones and ID cards
with security when they leave. Security
even escorts the cook on his morning
market trip.
The core issues of Pakistan are perpetuation
of feudalism and the lack of an independent,
intrepid judiciary. It is one of the
saddest days in its history that not
only has the Chief Justice of the Supreme
Court been removed unconstitutionally,
he is being treated like a petty thief.
No actually, like an armed and dangerous
fugitive.
If the charge of corruption and misuse
of power are correct, one wonders how
the Chief Justice did not calculate
that toeing the government line is really
the only way to perpetuate his lust
for that power and the glory. If police
motorcades, private jet jaunts and rest
house wings were his focus, why would
he act to actively get them cut off?
Clearly, his dispensation of justice
did not pander to his alleged grandiosity.
And now to “enlightened moderation”.
Justice Rana Bhagwandas was next in
line in seniority, but happened to be
on a trip to India at the time. Justice
Javed Iqbal was flown from Karachi to
be made acting Chief Justice. One wonders
why Justice Bhagwandas was not flown
in from an equidistant spot, possibly
even a shorter one. Is there a fear
that a Hindu would accede to the top
of the apex court, and the religious
of the land would be antagonized by
his ruling in the Federal Shariah Court?
Knowledge of the law and Islam are prerequisites
for the job, one’s own religious
orientation is irrelevant. The analogy
that a doctor does not have to suffer
each and every disease in order to treat
it applies well here.
The proceedings of the SJC will be held
in camera for “the respect of
the office of the Chief Justice”.
So, when it comes to judicial deliberations
and evidence and witnesses it is all
to be cloistered, but suspending him
before the SJC ruling and confining
him to his house and stripping him of
basic dignity is fine — he is
the Chief Justice when he is tried,
but a common man when he was fired.
Former American Ambassador Joseph Wilson
wrote an Op-Ed article in the New York
Times accusing the Bush government of
going to war in Iraq under the false
pretenses of it harboring weapons of
mass destruction. This raised the ire
of the Bush government and the identity
of Wilson’s wife Valerie Plame
being a CIA operative was leaked. In
this scandal vice-presidential aide
Lewis Libby was indicted on felony and
perjury charges. A sitting president
was deeply embarrassed by this indictment,
but justice was served in the bastion
of democracy that the United States
is.
In Pakistan though, the law of the jungle
applies, and might has historically
been right. With the treatment meted
out to judges in the past, as well as
the carrots that dangle before them
for the future, the decision of the
Supreme Judicial Council is a foregone
conclusion.
An Americanism is instructive: “what
goes around comes around”. Even
in the jungle.
(Mahjabeen Islam is a freelance columnist
and physician practicing in Toledo,
Ohio. Her email is mahjabeenislam@hotmail.com)
