it is evident that some people believed that senior judges would be as “manageable” as our more experienced politicians. This Monday’s formal decision by nearly the entire Islamabad High Court to stand up and resist what many of its justices regard as persistent meddling and intervention in their court and the issues they hear must have come as a shock to them.
One day later, the public was informed that six of the eight sitting judges on the IHC had sent a complaint to Pakistan’s chief justice, asking for advice from the Supreme Judicial Council on what to do when judges are blackmailed, harassed, or coerced by “members of the executive, including operatives of intelligence agencies.” The justices made it plain that they anticipated the judiciary would take some sort of action to restore its independence and repair the public’s declining perception of their institution.
The judges who co-signed the letter used a recent Supreme Court ruling that restored former IHC judge Shaukat Aziz Siddiqui’s status as a lawfully retired judge to justify their desire for a judicial convention to investigate the subject. Recall that in October 2018, retired justice Siddiqui was abruptly removed from the judiciary due to a complaint he had filed about Pakistan’s top intelligence agency interfering in cases involving PML-N leader Nawaz Sharif. The justices of the IHC seem to want the SC to take into account the hardships that sitting judges are going through and, at the at least, provide guidance on what judges should do in such circumstances, given that the SC supported retired justice Siddiqui’s perspective. Chief Justice Qazi Faez Isa is now in charge of the judiciary, thus pressure will be on him to act now that the ball is in his court.
It has been stated that a hidden camera was used to eavesdrop on a judge’s bedroom; another judge’s relative was kidnapped and coerced into testifying against them. Intelligence operatives started pestering the relatives and family of two judges, which made them reevaluate their stance on the maintainability of a high-profile case. According to a district and sessions judge, they were intimidated by a “cracker” that was hurled into their house. It is common to overlook politicians who are out of favour when they complain about threats, intimidation, or even torture; on the other hand, it is hard to ignore six sitting justices who expose egregious abuses of authority.
Justice Isa needs to pay attention to these concerns and resolve them to the satisfaction of his subordinate judges, even if it appears that he has known about them for about a year. As soon as this letter entered the public domain, the game was set, and everyone is watching the SJC to see how it plays out.
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