The ongoing judicial crisis has overtaken all other national issues and dominates the 2008 general elections, political and legal analysts told Business Recorder here on Thursday. They said that 90,000 members of the Bench and the Bar have shown an unprecedented unity and determination in their struggle to restore the pre-November 3 Judiciary.
This has surprised both the government and the opposition parties which are also reconsidering their focus and priorities. All Parties Democratic Movement (APDM) leaders Nawaz Sharif, Qazi Hussain Ahmad, Imran Khan, and Mahmood Khan Achakzai as well as and other nationalist parties have also made restoration of the sacked judges as their top demand to participate in the general elections.
Nawaz Sharif along with his senior party colleagues went to meet the deposed chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry at his residence in the Judges Colony here on Thursday, but a contingent of 300 policemen did not allow him to enter the Colony.
Both the APDM and the PPP are evolving a common strategy for restoration of the pre-November 3 Judiciary to ensure free and fair elections. The sacked chief justice of the Supreme Court and chief justices of Peshawar and Sindh high courts as well as more than three dozen other ousted judges of the superior courts insist that they could not be dismissed under the Provisional Constitution Order (PCO).
In an interview, Justice Rana Baghwandas has categorically stated that after restoration of the Constitution and lifting of 'emergency' on December 16, all the pre-November 3 judges would automatically be reinstated.
He said a seven-member bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry had ordered the government not to take any such action that was contrary to the independence of the Judiciary. The bench had also held that any appointment of CJP and other judges of the Supreme Court and high courts under the PCO would be unlawful and without jurisdiction.
Justice Bhagwandas was one of four judges who had declared that General Pervez Musharraf was not qualified to contest the 2007 presidential election.
He contended that after withdrawal of the PCO, the judges who had taken oath under the PCO would cease to be judges of their respect courts.
Commenting on the Justice Bhagwandas's statement, the caretaker Federal Law and Justice Minister Syed Afzal Haider said he would neither deny nor confirm Justice Baghwandas's viewpoint.
He said the government had issued retirement notification of 24 judges of the Lahore, Sindh, and Peshawar high courts pursuant to November 7 Supreme Court judgement.
In its judgement, the court headed by new Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar had declared that the judges who had not taken, or were not given the fresh oath under the PCO ceased to be judges of that court.
Analysts say that the legal fraternity, civil society and public consider the judges who had not taken oath under the PCO as their heroes. Representatives of the Pakistan Bar Council (PBC), Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA), and four high courts bar associations decided here on Wednesday to start social boycott of the judges who had taken oath under the PCO.
Meanwhile, under great pressure from the international community, the government on last Wednesday agreed to release the three prominent leaders of the lawyers movement, Aitezaz Ahsan, Ali Ahmad Kurd, and Tariq Mahmood in a couple of days.
Analysts said the presence of these luminaries of the legal profession in the bar rooms was enough to have an electrifying effect on the lawyers pro-democracy movement.
The fiery speaker Ali Ahmad Kurd, the articulate Aitezaz Ahsan, the undaunted and argumentative Munir A. Malik and Tariq Mahmood have proved their leadership qualities to all and sundry during past nine months. It is not surprising that they were the first to be picked up by the police on November 3, 2007 and hopefully to be released this week.
Aitezaz has already made his intentions clear. He plans to travel across the country on a 'judicial bus' to campaign for the restoration of the Judiciary to a pre-November 3 status.
One analyst said: "Aitezaz turned the tables with one CJP in his car", this time he would be carrying more than 40 judges in his bus", - one need not be a fortune-teller to know the outcome.
Analysts said that lawyers' struggle would take a new turn after 16th December 16, with the restoration of 1973 Constitution, fundamental rights and freedom of the press, as promised by President Pervez Musharraf.