The Washington Post – Pakistan’s Supreme Court sets collision course with new prime minister

By Richard Leiby

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan–Pakistan’s Supreme Court on Wednesday demanded that the nation’s brand-new prime minister follow an order to reopen a long-dormant corruption case against President Asif Ali Zardari, setting up the likelihood of a continuing constitutional crisis.

The court last week disqualified from office Yousuf Raza Gilani, Pakistan’s longest-serving prime minister, whom it convicted of contempt in April because Gilani refused to follow the same order.

The ruling party replaced Gilani with a former federal energy chief, Raja Pervez Ashraf, who has already indicated he will not comply with the order and who faces his own set of corruption charges in a separate case before the high court.

Some political and legal observers have accused the court, headed by populist, corruption-battling chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry, of working to destabilize an already-shaky civilian government. Ashraf and his predecessor maintain that the constitution grants the president immunity from prosecution, but the court has consistently ruled otherwise, saying no one is above the law. …..

Read more » The Washington Post

Judicial responsibility and organs of state

By Markandey Katju

After my article about the constitutional misbehaviour of the Pakistan Supreme Court was published in The Hindu (June 21), I received several queries and objections regarding it. Hence an explanation is called for, which I am giving below:

The first objection is that the British Constitutional principle, “The King can do no wrong” applies to a monarchy, not a republic. My answer is that I am well aware that Pakistan, like India is a republic. However, in both these countries, total immunity from criminal prosecution is granted to the President. Thus, Section 248(2) of the Pakistan Constitution states: “No criminal proceedings whatsoever shall be instituted or continued against the President or Governor in any Court during his term of office.” Article 361(2) of the Indian Constitution is identically worded.

Gilani challenges the leader of the opposition – Bring vote of no confidence if you have courage

Islamabad: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has said that he could only be removed by the Parliament and would accept the decision of the house.

Mr Gilani seemed confident during his speech in the National Assembly on Friday in the absence of Opposition Leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, who on Saturday announced that he would not let the prime minister to enter the house.

Gilani criticized Nawaz-League leadership for what he said their ego and said that Nawaz Sharif could not run the parliament as it was not an easy job.

“I challenge you to bring vote of no confidence against me if you have the courage,” Gilani said.

He said that he was punished for protecting the Constitution of Pakistan. He said that nobody other than National Assembly speaker could de-notify him.

The prime minister said that he would honour the decision of the house but would not accept conspiracies and would not let anyone to derail democracy in the country.

Gilanis said that the PML-N should look into results of Multan by-election in which the PPP won.

Courtesy: Geo TV News » TheNewsTribe

More details » BBC urdu

Pakstan Army that refused security to twice former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto because she was seen as pro-U.S., is to provide security to an American Mansoor Ijaz who is anti-Bhutto

– Security will be provided to Mansoor Ijaz: Army

ISLAMABAD: The meeting of corps commanders headed by the Army Chief General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani on Thursday decided to provide Mansoor Ijaz with security upon his arrival in the country for the hearing of memogate case, DawnNews reported. ….

Read more » DAWN.COM

http://www.dawn.com/2012/01/12/security-will-be-provided-to-mansoor-ijaz-army.html

via » Twitter » TF’s tweet

BBC – “Will the generals and judges force the president from power?” Pakistan’s political soap opera – By Owen Bennett Jones

Pakistan’s political soap opera

By Owen Bennett Jones, BBC News

Islamabad – Earlier this week, Pakistan’s prime minister appeared before the country’s Supreme Court to defend himself against allegations of contempt – it is symbolic of a dispute that is on-going at the centre of the country’s powerful elite.

When great institutions of state clash, history is made. It is the stuff of school history lessons – the Magna Carta, the Star Chamber, the Great Reform Act – that kind of thing.

But while in the UK such milestones have generally been once-a-century type events, in Pakistan they have become a way of life. Constitutional crises have become business as usual.

This week Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was forced to appear before the Supreme Court. He was there to face contempt proceedings related to the president’s immunity from prosecution.

I will spare you the details. But as I sat in the court’s press gallery, I felt pretty sure that in 100 years, Pakistani school children would not be learning about the January 2012 contempt case.

Perhaps they will be studying something the Western journalists did not even know was happening: a debate between some clerics on what role Islam should have in the state.

But the court was colourful. There was the prime minister, alongside him his brilliant lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan and a throng of ministers showing solidarity.

And buzzing about all of them, the journalists – representatives of Pakistan’s new, irrepressible 24-hour news television culture.

For millions of Pakistanis, the constant wrangling of the elite has the quality of a TV soap opera.

I do not want to belittle the importance of politics. The failure of successive elected and military governments has left millions of Pakistanis highly frustrated. But still the TV news shows attract massive audiences – people both despair of their leaders and want to know all about them.

Because many of the political parties are little more than family businesses, the same names have been around for decades – with power passed from father to daughter, brother to brother, and so on.

All this is against a backdrop of corruption cases, the frequent imprisonment of politicians, the “war on terror”, suicide attacks, assassinations, US military incursions – there is so much going on.

Pakistani news anchors can pirouette from the big news such as “The Prime Minister’s Day in Court”, to the tittle-tattle – the affairs, the hair transplants, the family rows.

“Will the generals and judges force the president from power?” …

Read more » BBC

Who sold Pakistan for a few Karors?

Najam Sethi’s analysis is spot on; his conclusion that ISI and other stake holders have done the Secured Release of Raymond Davis.

Courtesy: Geo TV (Aapas Ki Baat with Najam Sethi and and Muneeb Farooq, 16th March 2011)

via- Siasat.pk – You Tube

Pakistan’s populist judges : Courting trouble

– An overactive judiciary might undermine a fragile democracy

PAKISTAN’S chief justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, is riding high. At a time when most of the country’s political leaders are despised as venal, lazy or inept, its senior jurist is held in esteem. People tell pollsters they trust him more than anyone. They cheer his efforts to take on the corrupt and hapless president, Asif Ali Zardari. Yet Mr Chaudhry may be crossing a line from activist judge to political usurper.

His judges pass up no chance to swipe at the government. Mr Chaudhry spent months trying to get Swiss officials to reopen a corruption case that could have toppled Mr Zardari (in Pakistan, criminal proceedings against a sitting president are prohibited). After that failed, the courts took up a thin-looking case in which the president is accused of unconstitutionally holding an office for profit. That looks vindictive: the office in question is his post as head of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party.

The courts quickly adopt populist causes, especially those that squeeze Mr Zardari. After an American diplomat shot dead two men in the street in Lahore last month, the mother of one victim appealed for justice on television, saying that she would trust only Mr Chaudhry to help. The High Court in Lahore promptly ordered that the diplomat, who had been arrested, must not be allowed out of the country—even if the government were to rule that he had immunity. In this case, as in many others, the judges have shown themselves to be able self-publicists. Their stance has won approving coverage.

And on the country’s illiberal but widely popular blasphemy law, the Lahore High Court intervened to forbid the president from issuing an early pardon to anyone convicted by lower courts. Before the murder last month of Salman Taseer, the governor of Punjab and critic of the blasphemy law, Mr Zardari had told him he was planning such a pardon. The courts seem set on boxing him in. …

Read more : The Economist

Pakistan : Admit that can not survive with out aid??

Pakistan’s Ambassador to USA, Mr. Hussain Haqqani’s strength is his own brain.

Courtesy: Dunya TV (Najam Sethi Special – 25-09-2009 – 2 ) – You Tube link

What Will Happen in the Raymond Davis Case?

by Raymond Turney

It’s actually pretty hard to figure out what will happen as a result of the Raymond Davis incident, because Raymond Davis is not just a security guy/probable US intelligence operative (maybe he works for the CIA, but he might also work for the DIA, which is a part of the military) who killed two people. He is also a symbol of US dominance over Pakistan.

So for Pakistanis who tilt toward the Chinese (a much more reliable ally for the Pakistan Army than the US), or are Islamists his killings tap into a much deeper issue than whether one spy should be allowed to kill two other people, who were probably also spies. The issue is, what should the Americans be allowed to do?

From an American perspective, Raymond Davis may be doing work against AQ/Taliban types that the ISI should be doing. The ISI is refusing to do what to an American seems to be obviously the job of a national intelligence agency. So the Americans decided to do it themselves. When something went wrong, the Pakistanis promptly made things much worse, rather then quickly releasing the guy using his cover story. So from the American viewpoint, the case raises the issue of whether Pakistan is really willing to fight the Islamists.

I strongly suspect that the cover story leaves a fair amount to be desired. To the Pakistanis, the failure to have a decent cover story may seem like an insult. To the Americans, it’s a war and the cover story really isn’t important anyway.

There is also another issue, which is that demanding diplomatic immunity for someone who kills two people may remind Pakistanis of the British colonial occupation. While it probably isn’t widely sensed as an explicit parallel many middle and upper class Pakistanis remember the Brits, and not with fondness. One of the few things Indians and Pakistanis agree on is to blame the Brits … and US attitudes are a lot more like the old attitudes of the Brits than we in the US like to think.

So un one level it is a murder case, but on another level it raises bigger issues.

Courtesy: http://rememberjenkinsear.blogspot.com/2011/02/what-will-happen-in-raymond-davis-case.html

A Pakistani journalist on Raymond Davis issue

The language of program is urdu/ Hindi

Courtesy: Geo TV (Aapas ki Baat Najam Sethi ke Saath – 31st january 2011.)

via – ZemTV – You Tube Link

How the judges, generals and a section of media ruined Pakistan for their vested interests!

Courtesy: Express TV » (Front Line with Kamran Shahid, Oct. 30, 2010)

via – ZemTV/JustinTV – YouTube Link

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NAB Chairman ordered to Jail on contempt of court

SC announces to send NAB tops to jail

Courtesy: The News

ISLAMABAD: Supreme Court (SC) has ordered to put behind bars the Chairman of National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Naveed Ahsan and acting Chairman Irfan Nadeem, Geo News reported Tuesday.

The six-member SC bench headed by the Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Iftikhar Muhammed Chaudhry heard the Court Contempt notices against the NAB, Interior Ministry, the FIA and high-ups of Establishment Division for not implementing the SC’s NRO verdict.

The court also slammed the Swiss cases record’s being kept at Pakistan’s High Commission in London and said in its remarks that the matter relating the President’s immunity could be scrutinized if put before the court.

The NAB counsel Abid Zuberi told the court that Swiss cases record has been taken from the Pakistani High Commission, adding the record is sealed.

Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday wondered who would be responsible if the record is mishandled at the High Commission, adding this is the record which is under the custody of the criminals.

NAB chairman Naveed said the issue of President’s immunity is stumbling block in the matter relating Swiss cases. The CJ responded that if somebody faces problem over the issue, he would contact the court; addressing the NAB top official not to advocate it for nothing, as he (the President) did not claim the immunity.

The CJ Chaudhry told the NAB official that he will remain jailed until the NRO verdict is materialized.

Justice Chadhry Ijaz bristled in his remarks that the Executive is above the court’s verdict stemming its implementation.

NAB chief said he was on leave from March 9th in the wake of court verdict on the NRO.

Ahsan said he unconditionally apologizes to the Court, arguing that he was under wrong impression with regard to presidential immunity. The Chief Justice reprimanded Chairman Nab, saying that if someone has any thing to claim regarding immunity, he or she should come to the court to claim it, and that how could Chairman NAB decide on this matter on his own.

The CJ said if he does not send the responsible persons to the jail then he himself would fail his duties.

Though, the Swiss cases were not opened; but, the 60 million dollars of the country were searched for, he interrogated.

Chief Justice of Pakistan Justice Iftikhar Muhammed Chaudhry addressed the NAB chief, ‘You had 80 days; but, you didn’t take any action before going on vacations. The Court gave you one-day notice tomorrow. Now, we are sending you to jail on one-day notice, as you are the responsible for no implementation.’

‘You will stay in jail until the SC’s verdict on National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) is implemented; the NAB wasted over three months,’ the court scolded.

The CJ Chaudhry told Ahsan that he is being sent to Adiala Jail on contempt of court and the court would see about if the government shows up for his rescue.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Source – http://thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=101804