Judiciary-Executive Showdown

The doctrine of ‘Separation of Powers’ formulated in ancient Greece and incorporated within the Roman Republic was a model of governance to be employed by a state. The three organs Judiciary, Executive and Legislature are relatively autonomous and equivalent, while at times complimenting each other for the ‘greater good’ of the state.

Judiciary’s input to the state is to provide justice to the people by interpreting the law. Laws are written down in an abstract manner, the justice has the greater role of defining and using that law in a milieu. A prodigious justice applies law objectively and keeps a restraint from partiality. Executive enforces the law and operates the state. The legislature makes the law.

The Pakistan’s case had been quite different, in practicality. The Judiciary as a hawkish and maverick protagonist has outbalanced the power equation of the country. The messianic stance to rid off the country from inept and corrupt politicians is taken up by the Chief Justice, which has left no room for ‘judicial restraint’. Justice Chaudhry had been at odds with the President since 2009 when President Zardari had opposed reinstatement of the Judges and it has been carried on till 19 June action, when PM Yosuf Raza Gillani was dismissed under the pretext of ‘ridiculing’ the court under contempt laws of Article 63(1)(g). The Prime Minister refused to write to the Swiss authorities to reopen a dormant case against the President, which meant a direct attack to the President’s immunity as provided constitutionally under Article 248(2).

The crusade endeavor acquired by Justice Chaudhry has further disenfranchised democratic foundations in the country. Pakistan as fragile as before has now become a battleground for different patrons trying to overpower each other. The ‘separation of power’, the organs upholding power and strength of the state have now indulged in being at daggers with each other, leading the country into an array of chaos and downfall. The present scenario has driven the parliament to introduce amendments to protect its prerogative. A prerogative that is being threatened by the misuse of contempt laws by the Supreme Court.

The Judiciary has stepped in the shoes of the executive power, by venturing into influential political figures cases and broadening the clash between the two important state organs. Two perspectives reside within the Pakistani social fabric, one that favors the Court’s overreach into Pakistani politics perceived of a messianic character, the other which demeans judicial overarching role as tarnishing the democratic set up. In western countries, as of 1941 the US Supreme Court had declared contempt law proceedings as a violation to the freedom of expression mandated by the US Bill of Rights. The Pakistani Supreme Court, on the contrary has taken up contempt proceedings against an official, a former law minister for ‘reciting poetry’ and another official for ‘staring’ at the judicial authorities. This kind of impudence by the Judiciary, over the international debates has exacerbated the Pakistani politics and calls for denunciation and requires a revisit into our patterns and practices undertaken over the time.

Personal analysis as fashionably precast by certain commentators in and outside Pakistan has only but aggravated and allowed a rethought perspective over contemporary political rhetoric. It has been embraced by different interest groups so to suit their pompousness as nothing but a bulwark for their illicit role to be accepted by all and to go by it. The ‘greater good’, under the traditional political lens could not be met, as the three important functionaries are not performing their role as desired under the doctrine. On a side note, even if the two of them were obliging by their role, and one of them were outdoing their role to subdue the other, it would be a case of a failing state.