The legal community urged Pakistan’s Chief Justice Qazi Faiz Isa to uphold the rule of law on Saturday in response to the release of political leaders after their bail hearings and subsequent re-arrests of those same individuals.
The legal community claimed that some “powerful camps” have openly flouted the law without regard for its principles.
A conference on “On human rights, Pakistan Constitution and way forward” was held at a nearby hotel by the Lahore High Court Bar Association (LHCBA), including speakers from the legal community, political figures, and columnists.
The legal community compared this act of “disobedience”—in which political party officials were detained once more by filing new charges after receiving court orders for release—to an attempt to mock the Constitution. They also emphasized the importance of fair, transparent elections for political stability.
The country has been ensnared in the shackles of lawlessness; there is no law and no application of constitutional [provisions], so how could the country eke out progress? the lawyers argued.
Speaking at the event, renowned attorney Hamid Khan said that the Pakistani Constitution clearly states that the right to free speech is one of a person’s essential human rights.
He lamented the current political climate, in which no one is permitted to express their right to freedom. He claimed that to put the nation back on track, CJP Isa had to make sure that the law was supreme and that everyone was treated equally while applying it.
The attorney emphasized the need for a stronger system to ensure transparency and merit in the appointment of judges for high courts. He claimed that only changing the judicial commission’s regulations would make this conceivable.
To prevent any judge found to have committed misconduct from joining the Supreme Judicial Council, he claimed that the constitution of the body needed to be changed.
He claimed that using this approach would allow the judge who was the subject of misconduct accusations to face consequences under the standards of administering genuine justice.
Meanwhile, LHCBA Vice President Rabia Bajwa asserted that the events of May 9 were utilized to “halt the political process.” When they united to resist them, she declared that a “powerful camp would disintegrate.”
In his speech, seasoned attorney Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan claimed that he had never in his life witnessed such a flagrant contempt for the Constitution as was occurring right now.
He bemoaned the situation and recalled that the Supreme Court’s directive to hold Punjab’s provincial elections on May 14 was also disregarded.
“If courts pass orders to release the politician of a political party, they are again arrested in another case,” he complained.
He continued, “It appears this time a choice has been made not to abide by the court’s orders.
Liaquat Baloch, the leader of Jamaat-e-Islami, added that free and fair elections were a requirement for political stability. He also urged that a judicial panel be established to look into the events of May 9.
Ayaz Mir, a senior journalist, Habib Akram, analyst Orya Jan Maqbool, and other speakers also spoke at the conference.
