SC cannot adopt middle way in NRO case: Aitzaz
28 August, 2012
ISLAMABAD: Senator Aitzaz Ahsan on Monday said that if the government refused to write letter to Swiss authorities, the Supreme Court would give a similar ruling against Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf as it did against former premier Yousaf Raza Gilani.
Speaking to reporters at the Parliament House, Aitzaz said if the prime minister was disqualified, he will be replaced with a new one and the process would continue until the general elections.
He said a seven-member bench of the Supreme Court had disqualified the former prime minister in the NRO implementation case and now a five-member bench of the apex court could not adopt a middle way in the same matter.
He noted that the court had given the premier 22 days for taking a decision but no such relaxation was shown when he pursued the case for the former premier.
The senator said he had to go to London to participate in an international conference in February, but the court asked him to return within two days, and now the relaxation given to the prime minister showed the Supreme Court maintained that the decision of disqualification of Yousaf Raza Gilani was a hasty one.
To a question, he said he had served as lawyer of Yousaf Raza Gilani in the NRO case, but the prime minister had not asked for his services. He accepted that he had failed to pursue Gilani's case successfully.
The Supreme Court should review its decision in the NRO case as during the last 500 years, since the concept of modern state emerged, there was not a single example where a state presented its head in front of a court of another state.
Aitzaz said he attached importance to the independence of judiciary but he viewed the ruling of judiciary in accordance with the international law.
To another question, he said President Asif Ali Zardari had got immunity not as a person but as a head of state and that the courts must secure this office.
He said judges of the Supreme Court had been restored and there was no need of the approval of their reinstatement from parliament. The judges of the Supreme Court could not be sacked through an executive order, he added.
The senator said the statement of the Indian chief justice that the courts should not interfere in the affairs of the state, was valid. To another question, he said the lawyers' movement was fruitful as "it brought an end to the reign of a dictator, Pervez Musharraf".
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