Former SC judges call for neutral EC and rejects Musharraf ,s Amendments

Six former judges of the Supreme Court of Pakistan out of which five have also been Chief Justices of the Sindh High Court have demanded the re-constitution of the Election Commission of Pakistan before General Elections 2008 in agreement with all political parties. Addressing a press conference Tuesday at a local hotel, four of them - Justice Saeeduz Zaman Siddiqui, Justice Nasir Aslam Zahid, Justice Khalilur Rahman Khan and Justice Kamal Mansur Alam – announced that they have formed a Committee for the Rule of Law (CRL), keeping in view the prevailing scenario in the country. They held a meeting in Karachi Monday and considered the constitutionality and the impact of recent amendments made in the Constitution of 1973 by President Pervez Musharraf. After careful consideration, we rejected the constitutional amendments and reiterated our position that any individual, however powerful he may be, has no right to amend the Constitution and that Parliament alone has the authority to do this, they said. They clarified that the only power given to the Supreme Court under the Constitution is to interpret and declare what a particular provision of the Constitution or the law means. The amendment of the Constitution by an individual, therefore, is nothing but an act of usurpation of power of Parliament which cannot be justified on any known principle of jurisprudence. The judges also reiterated their earlier rejection of Gen. (retd) Musharraf’s alleged suspension of the Constitution under the garb of a Proclamation of Emergency, emphasizing that no court, authority or person has any right or jurisdiction to suspend the Constitution. The judges urged political parties not to undertake or validate any of the actions or legislative instruments of Gen. (r) Musharraf done or promulgated since November 03, 2007. The unauthorized amendments to the Constitution, the judges said, have robbed the ongoing process of elections of their credibility. Later, in informal question-answer session, they said that CRL was formed for to establish the rule of law and supremacy of Constitution of Pakistan. To another question, they said that judges removed under PCO-1 of 2007 are still judges, therefore no question of their inclusion in the CRL arises. ar qureshi