An impatient opposition

Let the law takes its course

The SC has finally sentenced Yousaf Raza Gilani after finding him guilty of contempt of court. The judgment puts a heavy burden on Gilani as it renders him ineligible for seeking election for the next five years. Anyone who wants rule of law in the country would readily agree that the courts’ judgments are to be implemented even if one considers them to be bad verdicts. While delivering the short judgment, however, the court has not denotified Gilani. He has, subsequently, presided over the cabinet meeting and attended a National Assembly sitting. The leaders of the allied parties who accompanied him to the court as a sign of solidarity subsequently expressed confidence in the prime minister. Gilani has in the meanwhile announced that he would appeal against the verdict. That is his legal right and everyone needs to wait for the outcome of the appeal.

Groups of PPP sympathisers in Sindh and the Seraiki region protested against the sentence. At some places, they turned violent. It is the responsibility of the PPP leadership to rein in its workers. Incidents of the sort are bound to be interpreted as attempts to pressurise the courts which must not be encouraged. The law must be allowed to take its course without external interference.

The interference is however is by no means one-sided. The PM’s impatient opponents also cannot wait for legal niceties to be completed. The verdict debarring Gilani from contesting election for five years has in fact fallen short of the opposition’s expectations that were duly projected by the like-minded media. The wish list included a longer sentence than the six months stipulated under that law, with immediate handcuffing and dragging the PM straight to jail added to it. Mian Nawaz Sharif and Imran Khan are at the head of the pack baying for Gilani’s blood. It is conveniently ignored that the PM has the right to appeal. It is also forgotten that there is a provision in the constitution which has to be followed for disqualification. A man condemned to death is not supposed to bring a rope with him, tie it to a tree trunk and put it around his neck himself. Similarly, the PM too has to be punished in the way detailed in Article 63(2) of the Constitution. The Article maintains, “If any question arises whether a member of Majlis-e-Shoora (Parliament) has become disqualified from being a member, the Speaker or, as the case may be, the Chairman shall, unless he decides that no such question has arisen, refer the question to the Election Commission within thirty days and should he fail to do so within the aforesaid period it shall be deemed to have been referred to the Election Commission.”

The opposition is, however, possessed by impotent rage. The PML(N) and PTI leadership have declared that Gilani is no more the PM. The opposition raised slogans during the National Assembly sitting on Thursday while Ch Nisar called on the ruling alliance to bring him to the NA if they dared. When Gilani turned up the next day and called on the opposition to bring a no-confidence motion if they wanted to send him home, Nisar and his comrades simply walked out. What was the need for heroics when Nisar knew that the cabinet and the allied parties were solidly behind Gilani? Was the drama meant to influence the court’s opinion?

Imran Khan has warned of a ‘tsunami’ march on Islamabad if the SC judgment was not respected. The PM has repeatedly said that he would willingly accept any verdict in his case delivered by the SC. Why does Imran think that the SC is incapable of getting its verdict implemented? The threat of agitation is yet another attempt to influence the SC through mob pressure.

While the supremacy of law has to be maintained, the courts too need to consider the best way to implement the laws. The laws are meant to create an orderly society. They are a means and not an end-in-themselves. Punishments are to be awarded only for meaningful social results. If the idea was to get the federal government to write a letter to the Swiss authorities, the letter remains unwritten. Even if Gilani no more holds the office, there is little hope of any of his possible successors ever dispatching the letter during the remaining few months of the government’s tenure. The confrontation between the judiciary and the executive, the two pillar of the state, could create a crisis and destabilise the system.

If Zardari is to be forced to bring back the illicit money he has hoarded abroad, the court needs to take recourse to some other measure rather than removing one PM after another. Maybe it can write to the Swiss authorities itself.

What many supporters of an independent judiciary had expected was that, once reinstated, it would improve the judicial system by making it less costly and less time consuming. This alone can rehabilitate the common man’s confidence in the dispensation of law and help in establishing the rule of law. When corruption remains rampant in lower echelons of judiciary and the higher judiciary is seen to be busy in deciding political cases, justice is likely to remain costly and delayed as before which would dent the common man’s respect for law and those who administer it.

The writer is a former academic and a political analyst.