Another member of the Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP) urged the chief judge of Pakistan (CJP), Yahya Afridi in accordance with the law.
In his letter, Senator Ali Zafar asked for the postponement of the planned meeting, citing concerns about the seniority dispute of the judges of the High Court of Islamabad.
The letter also stresses that four judges from the Supreme Court have already asked for the postponement of the meeting. In addition, he mentions that the transfer of judges has changed the IHC seniority list, which feared that these transfers were organized to influence the calls linked to the founder of PTI and Bushra Bibi.
Senator Ali Zafar suggested that it would be appropriate to respond to seniority problems before proceeding to judicial appointments.
In addition, he proposed that if the commission insists on holding the meeting, the recently transferred judges should not be considered for the appointment.
A few days ago, four judges of the Supreme Court of Pakistan, in a letter, demanded to suspend the process of appointing eight new judges to the Supreme Court until the challenges of the 26th amendment are decided.
The letter – signed by the main judge of the judge then Mansoor Ali Shah and the judges Munib Akhtar, Athar Minallah and Ayesha Malik – was addressed to the chief of Pakistan (CJP) Yahya Afridi.
The Pakistan Judicial Commission (JCP) should meet on February 10 to consider filling eight vacant seats of judges at the Supreme Court. The JCP approves judicial appointments. It was reconstituted to include four deputies by the Constitution (twenty-sixth amendment), 2024, which has made many changes relating to the judiciary.
The constitutional bench of the Supreme Court has taken up a certain number of challenges on the amendment.
“It is requested that the planned meeting and the appointment of eight new judges … be postponed until the dispute of the 26th constitutional amendment is decided in one way or another, or at least until that that the constitutional bench decides that requests for concession from a full court to a full court to listen and determine this challenge and until the question of the transfer of judges to the High Court of Islamabad and that their seniority is finally Determined on the judicial side, because we are given to understand that such challenges have been launched, ”says the letter.
The judges said that “the existing and continuous situation and certain recent developments” had forced them to apply. They stressed that the challenges of the 26th amendment persisted and languished before the constitutional bench.
“For various reasons, which, to some, is obvious to the point of manifesting themselves, these challenges were to be treated by the entire total court urgently and immediately, and would therefore have already been heard.
“The request to convene a full court has been translated by some of us earlier. However, the questions were sent to the constitutional bench, where a first official hearing was held after a considerable delay. Now the aforementioned meeting for Induction of the new judges have been planned … Surprisingly and rather in a hurry before the next audience date in said cases before the constitutional bench.
The judges said that development could “further endanger and erode public confidence and confidence rested in the institution”.
They stressed that the public’s confidence in the judiciary currently depended “crucially” in the way in which the pleas against the amendment were treated. “The enthronement of new judges, at this stage, which are clearly beneficiaries of the amendment, will weigh heavily on the flickering public trust which the trust of which it is played today and will make unnecessarily more complicated,” they added.
“The dilemma which will be created if the meeting goes ahead to achieve its indicated objective may be indicated as follows. If the constitutional bench accepts requests and directs the convocation of the full court to hear and decide the challenges of the amendment, The question will then inevitably occur as to which will include the full court to such a objective.
“This is the case because if at that time, eight new judges assumed the functions as proposed, it would create an abnormal situation. From a point of view, the full court would understand the new nominees. But they would have come Under the amendment itself. its independence.
“On the other side, the full court for the purposes at hand could only be the judges in the court at the time of the promulgation of the amendment, and still in office. But that could not say, would not be The full court and argues that in the modified circumstances, the full court cannot be at all to consider the challenges of the amendment. bed.
The judges wondered why the court was placed in such a position and “whose agenda and interests are served to expose the court to indignity and perhaps even that we regret saying ridiculous?” Why place the court on the horns of a avoidable dilemma? Is it not therefore imperative that the question of the induction of new judges is reassessed and, for the moment, put aside? These questions, we think, answer themselves. “”
The four judges asked that the Supreme Court must carefully examine the moment and composition of the whole court to preserve its integrity and credibility, which was not only that of the highest judicial institution but of the whole system legal.
“However, the detention of the meeting can prevent eliminating, if not effectively, precisely such a possibility. Any decision rendered by the whole court, if it is formed after the induction of new judges, may well not command confidence and Confidence.