Pakistan’s Supreme Court Chief Justice Chaudhry Retires

Today marked the retirement of the Chief Justice of Pakistan’s Supreme Court, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. Chaudhry has played a central role in many of Pakistan’s most dramatic developments in the past eight years during which he served on the court. AP has a capsule summary of some of those events:

He was appointed chief justice in 2005 and attracted national prominence two years later, when he was sacked by then-President Pervez Musharraf. He was reinstated in 2009 after a protest movement led by the nation’s lawyers.

I must confess to having been turned into a huge fan of Pakistan’s lawyers during this time. The images of hordes of lawyers clad in black suits and marching in support of the rule of law led to many fantasies of such things happening here in the US. It took two years of demonstrations and the election of a new government after Musharraf was forced to step down, but Chaudhry eventually was released from detention and returned to his spot on the bench.

It should be noted that current Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif played a large role in the final movement that procured Chaudhry’s release. The first four minutes of this story from Al Jazeera provide a good summary of those momentous developments:

[youtuber youtube=’http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QT5CyK9AsbM’]

Chaudhry will be a very tough act to follow.

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5 replies
  1. C says:

    While I too was impressed with the push for the rule of law in Pakistan it is worth noting that those rules include Blasphemy Laws which have been heavily used by these same lawyers to punish non-muslims with the courts blessing. Granted that it is the law and they are applying it but it qualifies my support for him.

  2. Greg Bean (@GregLBean) says:

    @C: Blasphemy Laws are contrary to any comprehensive Charter of Human Rights, BUT, are they much worse than the self censoring blasphemy standards imposed by fanatically christian countries that would never permit a President to reject christianity and all its delusion? For example, why are all US Presidents devout christians who believe in creation? What would happen to any sitting President or Presidential candidate who rejected religion?

    It is not only Muslim countries who condemn blasphemy? No, they are just more transparent about it.

  3. C says:

    Well while the U.S. has not elected many non-christians and jews to anything above city council (there is one muslim house rep I believe) we also don’t have laws that allow people to he hauled to jail or even killed on the grounds that they said they don’t believe. So yes I would argue not electing a muslim president beats jailing or killing christians or other muslims based upon he said/she said about their personal comments.

    That being said the point of my comment was to share what my reservations are about Justice Chaudhry and the lawyers not to claim perfection.

  4. Jim White says:

    A very interesting spat broke out among media outlets in Pakistan over exclusive video of Chaudhry’s final remarks to the court today. I found this article first in the Express Tribune, where the “guilty” outlet is not identified: http://tribune.com.pk/story/644399/conspiracy-allegations-nexus-between-sc-media-group-exposed/

    Turns out the exclusive went to Geo News: http://www.geo.tv/article-129907-Exclusive-video-stories-right-of-every-channel-Senior-Journalists-

    As for the issue of bad laws that Chaudhry and other legal professionals in Pakistan support, yes those are horrendous laws. But my inspiration from these folks came when they took to the streets, risking their lives, to insist on release of the Supreme Court justices that Musharraf had fired and jailed. This was quite a sight to see and came while the Bush administration was dismantling the rule of law here (before handing off the baton to Obama who has accelerated that process on some fronts). Does anyone think legal professionals in the US would risk their lives in a march to insist on one of their own being freed from jail? How many of them even lift their voices against the holding of prisoners at Guantanamo who have been illegally detained for a decade?

  5. C says:

    @Jim White:

    But my inspiration from these folks came when they took to the streets, risking their lives, to insist on release of the Supreme Court justices that Musharraf had fired and jailed. This was quite a sight to see and came while the Bush administration was dismantling the rule of law here (before handing off the baton to Obama who has accelerated that process on some fronts).

    On that point we agree.

    Does anyone think legal professionals in the US would risk their lives in a march to insist on one of their own being freed from jail? How many of them even lift their voices against the holding of prisoners at Guantanamo who have been illegally detained for a decade?

    Some might some might not. So far neither Obama or Bush sentenced judges to life in prison. They haven’t needed to as they have gotten all the support that they wanted even judges on the FISA court who see problems have been spineless enough to do so quietly.

    Still there are others who have taken on the cases of those at Guantanamo bay, who are getting arrested at protests along with their clients, and who are even defending a Persona Non Grata like Al Awlaki. It’s just that none of them are in robes and most of the media is too busy following orders to notice.

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