To the courts

Better sense prevails

It was almost surreal to witness the prime minister appearing in person before a seven member special bench of the Supreme Court in a contempt of court case. Neither he nor his eloquent and able lawyer Aitzaz Ahsan offered an unqualified apology for not writing to the Swiss authorities for reopening the corruption cases against President Asif Ali Zardari.

The courtroom was packed with the supporters of the prime minister, mostly his cabinet colleagues .Understandably, apart from a bevy of lawyers, there was a large media contingent present including a number of familiar faces from the electronic media one sees pontificating every evening on different news channels.

The news channels and the so-called beeper culture have changed the manner in which Supreme Court proceedings are reported. Technically speaking, cell phones are not allowed in the court premises.

But most media organisations have reporters flitting in and out of the courtroom busy giving one-liners to their respective news channels over their cell phone. The judges, ordinary mortals and playing to the gallery (literally in this case), enjoy this media attention.

This was in sharp contrast to the time when Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif was hauled up for contempt in courtroom number 1, by Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah back in December 1997. At that time, electronic media apart from the government-controlled PTV was non-existent.

Nawaz Sharif like Yousaf Raza Gilani personally appeared in the court and offered an unqualified apology. Chief Justice Shah bent upon getting rid of him (and in cahoots with the then president Farooq Leghari as it turned out to be later) refused to accept it.

Nawaz would have been history had the then COAS General Jehangir Karamat not refused to be drawn in the conspiracy hatched by Leghari and Shah with the tacit backing of the then ISI chief Lt-General Naseem Rana. Karamat’s non-cooperation forced Leghari to resign. It is another matter that Nawaz bit the hand that had fed him by sacking Karamat within less than a year.

Another contrast that can be safely drawn on the day of Gilani’s appearance in the apex court is the orderly behaviour of the PPP supporters and virtual absence of the ubiquitous jiyalas. PML(N), which now has become a champion of an independent judiciary, left no stones unturned to intimidate the court through its workers back in 1997.

Not only Akram Sheikh, the advocate opposing Nawaz at that time, was roughed up by a senior party stalwart, a few days later the apex court was stormed by an unruly PML(N) mob. The manner in which Sajjad Ali Shah’s court was divided and destroyed by a combination of coercion and bribery is an unsavoury part of our judicial history.

The present members of the apex court are united behind the chief justice and give him the respect he deserves. But ironically, some senior members of the ruling party unjustifiably brand the present court as the “Sharif Court”.

The relief given to Nawaz in a National Accountability Bureau(NAB) appeal against the release of Sharif’s family assets recently raised many an eyebrow in the PPP. They feel that selective justice is being meted out.

Sadly, the attitude of a sizeable swath of the black coats leaves a lot to be desired. Chanting slogans against Aitzaz and Zardari and in favour of the Chief Justice on the day of the contempt hearing in the premises of the court, they gave the impression that somehow Aitzaz had betrayed the cause of an independent judiciary for which he had struggled so hard. This undemocratic behaviour from those who are mandated by their profession to uphold the rule of law is indeed sad.

During the contempt proceedings, mostly Justice Asif Saeed Khosa and Justice Sarmad Jalal Usmani questioned Aitzaz about why the government’s refusal to write the letter to the Swiss authorities did not constitute contempt of the apex court. Aitzaz as an independent jurist had been maintaining that there was no harm in writing to the Swiss authorities as Zardari would still enjoy sovereign immunity.

As the counsel of the prime minister, Aitzaz Ahsan was being put on the spot. However, he cleverly argued that no contempt of the court had been committed as the chief executive was of the firm view that the president of Pakistan enjoyed immunity from prosecution past or present, within the country and abroad, according to the constitution.

Those expecting speedy justice wishing Zardari and Gilani to be hanged in one stroke must have been sorely disappointed. Although the counsel for the prime minister did not get the time he had asked for, the court did grant him ten days to prepare his case.

The conciliatory atmosphere permeating the court was in sharp contrast to previous days when the hard-hitting rhetoric and professionally incompetent methods of the maverick Babar Awan were creating tensions. Better sense has finally prevailed and the government has decided to fight this case on legal grounds rather than put up a sloppy political defence.

Some observers who have been dismissing Gilani as a rubber stamp prime minister living under the shadow of Zardari (a la Shaukat Aziz) are pleasantly surprised by his newfound assertiveness . The decisive manner in which he sacked the defence secretary Lt-General(rtd.) Naeem Khalid Lodhi for violating the rules of business and his statement to a Chinese news agency at a time when General Kayani was on an official visit to China not only raised eyebrows but also triggered an angry response from the military.

Apparently these moves by Gilani did not have the prior approval of the presidency. The prime minister also successfully thwarted moves to induct Babar Awan as law minister. He has also made it clear that Babar is not welcome back in the federal cabinet in any other capacity.

Despite the temporary respite from the contempt case, other legal challenges especially the memo case hang like the sword of Damocles over the government’s head. It is trying its best to meet the goal of holding the Senate elections under its auspices, an opportunity denied to previous PPP and PML(N) governments by the powers that be lest they become too powerful.

No civilian government in Pakistan has been able to evolve a modus vivendi with the military. Most of the governments had been declared corrupt and incompetent by coupsters who replaced them and were condoned by the higher judiciary almost without exception.

But now it is commonly accepted that the condition for another coup in Pakistan are not ripe. Nevertheless, there are those who believe that a ‘slow coup’ is already underway. They are entitled to their views. But only history will judge what the courts did or did not do to break the vicious circle.

The writer is Editor, Pakistan Today