Pakistan Court Reinstates Chief Justice, Rebuffs Musharraf
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan _ In a dramatic blow for U.S.-backed President Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s Supreme Court reinstated Judge Iftikhar Chaudhry to his post as chief justice Friday.
Reversing Musharraf’s decision to suspend Chaudhry from his post, the Supreme Court also ruled a series of government charges against the chief justice as “illegal.”
Moments after the ruling was read, hundreds of lawyers and supporters of Chaudhry rushed out of the courtroom, leaping over chairs and pumping their fists as they chanted “Go, Musharraf, go.”
They formed a crowd outside, on the courthouse stairs and shouted “Musharraf is a traitor.”
It was, by all accounts, a historic moment for Pakistan. The court had rarely defied Pakistan’s political establishment and had been relied on in the past to legitimize military coups, such as the one that brought Musharraf to power in 1999.
The court’s decision capped a week of upheaval in Pakistan that has raised questions about Musharraf’s ability to secure his nation.
More than 155 people have been killed in a series of ambushes on military convoys and suicide bombings at political rallies, police academies and a mosque. The violence has stretched from tribal areas along the Afghan border to the west, to Islamabad in the east, and down to the southern province of Baluchistan.
Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz called for calm amongst a “difficult and stressful time” in a statement issued Friday through Pakistan’s state news agency.
“I would like to emphasize that we must all accept the verdict with grace and dignity reflective of a mature nation,” Aziz said. “This is not the time to claim victory or defeat.”
Musharraf provoked the judicial showdown by trying to pressure the chief justice, Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, to resign in March. After Chaudhry’s refusal, the government suspended him and filed a long list of accusations of misconduct.
An alliance of lawyers’ associations and opposition parties organized a series of protests across the country, and tens of thousands of Pakistanis lined the streets to cheer Chaudhry and throw rose petals in the path of his convoy.
Many in Pakistan thought that Musharraf moved against Chaudhry because he feared that the judge would take up cases later this year examining the legality of Musharraf continuing to be both the nation’s president and its top general. Chaudhry is known for ruling against the government on issues such as citizens allegedly abducted by security forces.
Before adjourning the court to deliberate Friday afternoon, presiding justice Khalil-ur-Rehman Ramday said he wanted the nation to know that the decision he and the 12 other judges made would not be in defiance of the military.
“We are not here competing with any other institution,” he said.
But after the court reconvened, and Ramday read the decision, Chaudhry’s backers said that the ruling was a serious blow to the military.
“The army general government has been refused its sanctity,” said Ali Ahmad Kurd, a senior attorney representing Chaudhry. “He (Musharraf) should resign, he should leave the president’s house, he should go.”
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(c) 2007, McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.
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