Karachi:
The judge of the Supreme Court Athar Minallah has lamented that the nation has not learned anything from history, whose “distorted” version is taught children in our schools.
“A society where the truth disappears is intended for collapse. Pakistan’s break in 1971 was rooted at the time of its creation, and books exist to prove it,” said the judge of the Apex court on Thursday.
The Minallah Justice was heading to a seminar in Karachi organized in the city’s courts by Karachi’s lawyers on judicial independence, constitutional government and access to justice.
The seminar was attended by the former president of the Supreme Court Law Association (SCBA), Munir A Malik, main lawyers, Karachi bar officials and a large number of defenders.
The judge said that the people of the former Eastern Pakistan did not want to separate, but “we move them away.” He said that true rulers are people and their representatives should come to power through free and fair elections. “However, it is still just a dream to this day,” he said.
He said that Pakistan’s 77 -year system has deteriorated to the point that people even openly appoint the five “heroes judges.” “If those judges had been adopted as models to follow, the dictatorship would never have taken roots,” he said.
Remembering the movement of lawyers, he said that 90 lawyers sacrificed their lives during resistance against former military dictator Pervez Musharraf. “We can’t betray those 90 people,” he said. “Our generation has already caused the damage. We cannot blame others; we did this with our own hands.”
Speaking about his oath as judge, Judge Minallah said that since he has sworn in the name of Allah, there is no need for more promises. That oath, he said, forced him to decide the cases in accordance with the law, without fear, and to defend the Constitution.
“Because I swore on behalf of Allah, I am responsible with him. If there is no constitutional government in the country today and, as a judge, I do nothing, then I am violating my oath.” He pointed out that Great Britain has no written constitution, but the rule of law prevails there.
He praised the Karachi lawyers association for standing with Mohtarma Fátima Jinnaah against the dictatorship of General Ayub Khan.
“The whole base of the Constitution is that the right to the rule belongs only to the chosen representatives of the people. However, we deceive ourselves and even God ignoring this oath. If we only honor our oaths, the rights of people could protect themselves.”
Munir to Malik also addressed the seminar, saying that the “hybrid systems” essentially mean dictatorship, not a constitutional governance. The only way to follow, he said, is the Constitution.
He recalled that when the east and western Pakistan governed a Constitution, a chosen assembly had been formed without rigging. When that assembly prepared a Constitution, it was dissolved by the civil and military establishment, sitting the foundations of Pakistan’s rupture.
He recalled that even General Ziaul Haq admitted that the judges condemned Zulfikar Ali Bhutto under pressure, despite having initially denied it.
Malik said Karachi Bar is the same platform where Quaid-E-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah once went to the lawyers. “This bar has always been a wall against illegality,” he said, praising Judge Athar Minallah as a vital part of lawyers’ movement.
