Another round of legal battle in the offing in Pakistan

Asif Haroon Raja
Email: ah.raja@yahoo.com

PML-Q was cocksure of its victory at the Centre and in Punjab and Balochistan with sizeable presence in other two provinces. This overconfidence was based on its huge development works it had undertaken during its five-year stint, the establishment and intelligence agencies led by the President in uniform on its side, district governments in its grip, Election Commission and interim governments favourably inclined and Sharif brothers in exile. In its reckoning PPP was its chief rival which it could deal with through pre-poll, during poll and post poll rigging. The only hurdle in the way of President-Q League alignment to acquire another ticket for five-year joyride was that of Judiciary. Possible axing of President would have rendered the King party orphaned. Hence it was mutually decided by the duo and its legal advisers to impose mini-martial law and remove the thorn of judiciary once and for all.

Although the rebellious judges were removed and replaced with pliant judges under the PCO, however, the hue and cry made by the lawyers, journalists, human rights activists, civil society and political forces as well as US and western powers compelled the President to not only lift emergency but also remove his uniform and announce election dates. Elections on 8 January were set by the kingmaker with an assured mind that its King Party would return to power or as a minimum there will be a hung parliament in which his party would be one of the major stakeholders both at the centre as well as in the provinces. Before calling it a day on 15 November, the outgoing ruling coalition gave a parting gift to its mentor by way of validating all its unconstitutional acts. This was done to ensure his continued support in the future as well.

The first setback which the Q League suffered was the unexpected return of Sharif brothers on 25 November. Although President Musharraf had made a last ditch effort to prevent their return till the elections by undertaking a journey to Jeddah, however, he returned unsuccessful. Matters worsened when the two arch-rivals PPP and PML-N aligned together against King’s Party and its mentor and Nawaz League started to gain popularity in Punjab rapidly. However, with undamaged safety valves placed around it and no major desertion of its members having taken place, the confidence of Ch brothers to win the race also remained intact. The second setback occurred on 27 December when Ms Benazir was assassinated which generated huge sympathy wave for the PPP. Postponement of elections date favoured PML-N since it got some extra time to campaign and raise the issue of judges. These developments eroded the confidence of Q League and it started to reluctantly cede victory to the PPP but placed itself closely behind it. Atta crisis together with load shedding of gas and electricity dug the last nail in the coffin of Q League.

It was essentially because of upsurge of anti-Musharraf sentiments throughout the country that his King’s Party suffered a humiliating defeat in the polls. The party that was looking forward for another five-year stint under the safe wings of its mentor was booted out. As many as 39 ministers suffered defeat and some high profile figures lost their security money as well. Its victory in Balochistan was made possible because of the vacuum left behind by the local nationalist parties that had boycotted elections. Millions spent on image building went down the drain. MQM despite having followed highly pro-Musharraf policies and resorting to fascism succeeded in winning maximum seats in urban Sindh because of massive official assistance provided by caretakers, local governments and governor to carry out pre poll rigging and selective rigging on polling day through hooliganism. Geo managed to capture some scenes of blatant rigging in Karachi. But for pre-poll rigging and selective rigging on D-day both by Q League and MQM and boycott by APDM, number of seats captured by pro-Musharraf parties would have been much less.

Its relegation to third position and emergence of PML-N as the leading party in Punjab and second at the Centre left them dumbfounded. A bigger shockwave struck them when calls for ouster of their patron became deafeningly noisy and PPP-PML-N continued to sail in the same boat irrespective of their ideological differences and differing views on certain crucial issues. Their pains heightened when Zardari brushed aside repeated attempts by Q League’s leading lights to breach the alliance. President’s camp office became a nucleus of activities where endless conspiracies were hatched to push out PML-N and to forge a new alliance of PPP-PML-Q-MQM-ANP. Not only those sinister efforts failed, the Q League began to splinter with grave consequences for its creator. The bombshell fell when Nawaz and Zardari accompanied by their party members had a historical meeting at Bhurban and signed a summit declaration for the formation of coalition government and restoration of sacked judges within 30 days by passing a resolution through the new parliament. It dashed their high hopes that the two would not be able to resolve their differences and would fall apart. President’s legal advisers are now burning their midnight oil to prevent such a happening under the pretext that two-thirds majority will be required to undo the wrong committed by the President on 3 November. Aitzaz, Tariq, Kurd and the super charged corps of lawyers as well as retired judges are all of the view that an executive order or a simple majority resolution is sufficient to restore the judges since Musharraf’s acts on 3 November were unconstitutional. They are keeping the lawyers’ movement alive and kicking and have now threatened to besiege the President’s camp office in Rawalpindi in case he tries to hamper reinstatement of judges.

Reverberations within the ranks of PPP on the issue of nomination of candidate for the slot of PM and Makhdoom Faheem’s apparent annoyance of being let down are seen by the conspirators as good signs to cash in. The phlegmatic Makhdoom from Hala is being zealously cajoled and instigated to form a rebel group so that the establishment could help him in attaining his dream of becoming the PM, but it appears that their efforts will not succeed and the issue will be amicably resolved. Judges issue would however become a sticking point since the planned parliament’s resolution would be just a preliminary step and in no way the final verdict to reinstate them. The resolution can traverse all the legal hurdles speedily provided the President is willing and cooperative. The resolution will either be vetoed by him or stayed by the Supreme Court. The only way out is to muster two-thirds majority and amend the constitution and also work for impeachment of the President. The nation should be quite prepared for another round of long drawn legal battle which will be at the cost of attending to the problems of the people. The new legislature has commenced its journey from 17 March onwards. Till Zardari takes over as executive head of the legislature, the pendulum of power would remain tilted towards the Cabinet comprising heavy weights from PPP and PML-N and hopes of intriguers will stay alive.

—The writer is a defence and political analyst.Courtesy: Pakistan Observer, 23/3/2008