Former lieutenant colonels Khalid Abbasi and Abdul Ghaffar Babar say they were detained for a period of 21 months and then expelled from the Pakistan Army after being court-martialed on charges of misconduct during former COAS Pervez Musharraf’s tenure. The two then decided to move the Supreme Court.
“We have recently held in Col (retired) Ikram’s case that the Supreme Court has no jurisdiction under the constitution to hear appeals against army courts,” explained Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry who was heading the three-member bench. “You should approach the concerned forum to file such an appeal.”
But Siddiqui was insistent that no such forum was available. “The army court has dismissed my clients’ appeal, even though my clients were detained for 21 months on baseless charges and later expelled from service.”
Siddiqui maintained that the field general court marshal had initially decided in his clients’ favour but was pressurised by the GHQ to review this decision. “The FGCM came back with a malafide decision to punish Abbasi for six months and dismiss him from service and Babar was to be punished for three years and then dismissed.” Given the decision was patently malafide, argued Siddiqui, the court had the jurisdiction to hear the appeals as it had entertained many such cases before.
“Our latest judgment says the Supreme Court has no jurisdiction to hear appeals against the decisions of army courts,” reminded Chaudhry before dismissing the appeal.
But Siddiqui began haranguing the court till Justice Khalilur Rehman Ramday threatened to revoke his license, at which point senior advocate Zafar Ali Shah intervened and persuaded Siddiqui to be seated.
Meanwhile, the ex-army officers began creating a ruckus at the rostrum till the chief justice asked two police officers to remove them from the court.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 17th, 2010.
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