Educate youth on perils of dictatorship, SCBA urges Imran

“We (lawyers) will support democracy no matter what stand political parties take” says SCBA president

ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) rejected on Wednesday PTI chief Imran Khan’s assertion regarding people distributing sweets after a possible military coup in the country, saying lawyers would resist any extra-constitutional move aimed at toppling the democratic set-up.

President of the SCBA Ali Zafar told The Express Tribune: “We (lawyers) will support democracy no matter what stand political parties take.”

He said that although lawyers believed democracy to be the best system of governance, it “does not mean they (lawyers) will stop criticizing the government over its incompetence”.

Ali Zafar told the PTI chief that instead of giving such controversial statements, he should educate youth about the dreadful consequences of dictatorships.

But, he said, when compared with any other institution in the country, the army was the only one which was organized and strong, adding that it helped the nation during floods as well as census.

Regarding the Panama Leaks issue, he said that after the failure of political parties to frame the terms of reference (ToRs), he started consultation with office-bearers of other bars to devise strategy.

According to him, the bar was planning to hold a roundtable discussion on the Kashmir issue next week, attended by representatives of all parliamentary parties, adding that envoys of the United Nations (UN), Europe Union (EU) etc were also scheduled to attend the meeting.

“The main objective of this discussion is to pursue all political parties for evolving a uniform policy on the Kashmir issue” the SCBA president said.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 21^st, 2016.