The Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP) is set to meet here on Monday (today) to consider the elevation of eight high court judges to the Supreme Court despite calls from some judges and sections of the legal community to defer the meeting.
Just days ago, four Supreme Court judges wrote to Chief Justice Yahya Afridi, who also heads the JCP, requesting a postponement. Additionally, a JCP member also wrote a separate letter urging the chief justice to delay the new appointments to the apex court.
The revamped JCP would meet here on Monday (today). It was expanded through the 26th Constitutional Amendment. The 13-memner JCP is led by the chief justice of Pakistan, and includes four judges of the apex court, as well as parliamentarians from both treasury and opposition and others.
Sources indicate that the meeting is expected to approve the elevation of the chief justices of the Islamabad High Court (IHC), Sindh High Court (SHC), Balochistan High Court (BHC), and Peshawar High Court (PHC) to the Supreme Court. Additionally, two judges from the SHC and two from the PHC are also likely to be elevated.
Besides SHC Chief Justice Siddiqui, according to the sources, the JCP would consider four names for an elevation to the apex court. Similarly, the sources said, PHC Chief Justice Ishtiaq Ibrahim's elevation was likely, while JCP would consider four other names for an elevation to the Supreme Court.
The sources further said that IHC Chief Justice Aamer Farooq and BHC Chief Justice Kakar were likely to be elevated to the Supreme Court, while two senior judges in the LHC would be considered. The sources said that LHC Chief Justice Aalia Neelum was likely to stay in the high court.
On the other hand, the sources said, the JCP had invited names for four appointments as additional judges in the LHC. The names had been invited by February 13 in the context of the February 6 meeting of the JCP, they added.
Meanwhile, the lawyers were divided on the issue of elevation of the judges to the Supreme Court. A section of the lawyers said that the process should deferred until the decision on the court challenges to 26th Constitutional Amendment, and the recent transfer of three judges to the IHC.
In the last few days, four Supreme Court judges and five IHC judges, besides JCP member Senator Ali Zafar, wrote separate letters to Chief Justice Afridi to postpone the JCP meeting until decisions on the pending appeals against 26th Amendment and the new seniority list of the IHC judges.
The All Pakistan Lawyers Action Committee (APLAC), which represented the lawyers, who opposed the 26th Amendment, in a statement endorsed the demand of the four judges abouot postponement of JCP meeting and delaying the appointment of the new judges.
The statement, signed by several former presidents and office-bearers of the Pakistan Bar Council (PBC) and the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and other bars, including Muneer A. Malik, Hamid Khan, Ali Ahmed Kurd, Qazi Anwar, Abid Zuberi, vowed to defend the independence of the judiciary.
The APLAC announced that the lawyers from across the country would hold a token protest march at the Supreme Court on Monday (today) for demanding the rollback of 26th Amendment and a full court hearing of the appeals against it, without the inclusion of any new appointees.
"This protest will serve as a strong and united message from the legal fraternity that any efforts to subjugate the judiciary or manipulate its composition will not be tolerated, it said. "We reaffirm our unshakable resolve to defend the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law."
However, the current office-bearers of the PBC, the SCBA, and the provincial bars, issued a separate statement in favour of the JCP, strongly rejecting and condemning the so-called call for protest aimed at sabotaging the JCP meeting.
The lawyers' bodies regretted that some political factions within the legal community were "trying to create chaos and division to achieve their nefarious political objectives" and their questionable political agendas.
"We assure these factions that their futile exercises carried out by political elements are bound to fail and will soon become ineffective. Once again, we, the elected representatives, want to make it clear that we support all the actions of the Judicial Commission of Pakistan," the joint statement stated.
They termed the formation of the JCP the most balanced in recent times, adding that they accepted the 26th Constitutional Amendment and the events that followed as part of the Constitution. "It is the duty of every law-abiding citizen to follow this framework," the statement added.
"We, the elected representatives of the legal community, have always stood for the rule of law, independence of the judiciary, supremacy of institutions and upholding the Constitution, the joint statement said.
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