Islamabad – President human rights cell of the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Farhatullah Babar on Sunday said that a historic opportunity had presented itself to do away with a chaotic approach to the constitution by setting up and federal constitutional court and streamline procedure for the appointment of judges to guard against a dangerous tendency of a judiciary of the judges, for the judges by the judges.
He was speaking at a dialogue with civil society at SZBIST in Islamabad.
He said that the Parliament through 18th Amendment sought to rationalise judges’ appointment but the judiciary under Chaudhry stood in the way and discreetly threatened to undo the constitutional amendment if the Parliament itself did not revisit this provision. Unfortunately the Parliament and the political parties had cold feet and back tracked.
A constitutional court is needed to address constitutional issues alone so as to reduce burden of cases of ordinary litigants and inject an element of provincial balance in addressing constitutional issues. If the political power has been rationalised among provinces by setting up senate why the judicial power should also be not balanced between provinces by providing for equal number of judges from all provinces in it, he asked.
He said that nearly four lac cases were pending in the courts of which over 60 thousand were in the SC because the constructional cases have to be accorded priority and they also take time. As the common litigants suffer incalculably the trust in the state and judiciary also erodes.
He said that after the 18th amendment the constitutional court is needed to address issues between the federation and the provinces.
Rejecting the claim that the constitutional court was against the basic structure of the state, he said that the basic structure of the state rested on the separation of powers, the independence of judiciary and the fundamental rights of the citizens and asked in what way the constitutional court undermined the so called basic structure or independence of judiciary.
The seminar was also addressed by ex Senator Afrasiab Khattak, Barrister Masood Kausar, CEO Bhutto Foundation Asif Khan, General Secretary PPP HR Cell Samana Malaika Raza and followed by interactive session with lawyers, academia, media, former civil servants, political activists and other members of civil society.
