Pakistani Supreme Court Changes History

DAWN.COM | Pakistan | Supreme Court strikes down Nov 3 emergency

ISLAMABAD: In what has been billed as a verdict that may change the course of the country’s political and judicial history, the Supreme Court on Friday denounced successive military takeovers over the past four decades and their endorsement by the superior judiciary and then went ahead to declare Gen Pervez Musharraf’s Emergency Order of Nov 3, 2007, and most of the actions taken under it, including the appointment of over 100 superior court judges, as illegal and unconstitutional.

In a judgment that has no precedence in the country’s judicial history, a 14-judge bench, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, declared unconstitutional Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar’s appointment as the Chief Justice of Pakistan after the imposition of emergency. The court decided to refer to the Supreme Judicial Council the cases of Justice Dogar and other judges who had defied the order of a seven-judge bench on the same day and took oath under the PCO.

The verdict was quite clear on many points. It declared Gen Musharraf’s action of declaring emergency on Nov 3, 2007, as illegal and unconstitutional, but refrained from passing any order against him.

It also declared all appointments of judges since Nov 3 taken in consultation by, what it described as an unconstitutional chief justice, as illegal and that they ceased to exist as judges with immediate effect.

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