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Pakistan bar rejects challenge to new chief justice but denounces emergency

By Bernard Hibbitts (editor) and University of Pittsburgh School of Law students.

[JURIST] The Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) on Saturday voted down a challenge to the constitutionality of Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar's appointment, as Pakistani Law Minister Farooq H. Naek defended Dogar as the lawful chief justice. The PBC unanimously adopted a measure denouncing as illegal the November 2007 declaration of emergency rule by then-Pakistan president Pervez Musharraf that led to the ousting of former Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry. Despite the condemnation, the PBC voted 6-12 against a call to reinstate Chaudhry as chief justice. Also defeated was a resolution to take action against Dogar for allegations that he abused his position to secure his daughter's admission to medical school. Following the vote, National Assembly Standing Committee on Education Chairman Abid Sher Ali sent a letter to President Asif Ali Zardari urging him to seek Dogar's resignation. The challenges to Dogar were introduced by recently-elected president of the Pakistan Supreme Court Bar Association Ali Ahmad Kurd, who has taken up the charge to reinstate Chaudhry as the "constitutional" chief justice of Pakistan. Last month, members of the Pakistan lawyers' movement renewed their demands for the reinstatement of all superior court judges dismissed by Musharraf's emergency rule. Although Pakistani officials have now reinstated most of the over 60 judges ousted by Musharraf, Naek has repeatedly insisted that Chaudhry will not be reinstated because Dogar was legitimately appointed and the Pakistani Constitution does not permit the appointment of two chief justices.

Full post as published by JURIST - The Paper Chase on December 14, 2008 (boomark / email).