Islamabad, Nov 9 (PTI) Pakistan’s joint parliamentary committee of the Senate and National Assembly on Sunday approved the 27th constitutional amendment bill with the opposition alleging that the government was sounding “the death knell for the Supreme Court.” The amendment proposes a change in Article 243, seeking to abolish the ‘Chairman, Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee’ and introduce a new ‘Chief of Defence Forces.’ Other proposals under the same amendment include establishing a Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) and reducing the powers of the Supreme Court.
Senator Farooq Naek of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), who chaired the meeting of the joint parliamentary committee, told the media after it was over that “the meeting unanimously approved the basic draft of the bill.” “There are some minor sections which the committee authorised me (NaeK) and law minister (Azam Nazir Tarar) to settle,” he said. “Everything has been done with consensus.” The Senate is scheduled to meet at 11 am on Monday to take up the bill in the light of the committee report and vote on every amendment and pass it by a two-thirds majority.
After the Senate, it would be presented before the National Assembly, where it must pass a two-thirds majority again. In the final stage, it must get the president’s approval to become a law.
Meanwhile, the new amendment came under severe criticism in the Senate session earlier in the day, when opposition Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) Senator Ali Zafar said that the proposed constitutional amendment would “sound the death knell for the Supreme Court.” “The way you are amending the Constitution, (it) is like destroying a structure,” Zafar said as he addressed the session.
He stressed that Parliament is formed by the people’s vote and that the Constitution guarantees citizens’ fundamental rights. An independent judiciary, he added, is the guarantor of democracy, with civilian supremacy a core principle.
Zafar also questioned the legitimacy of the current Parliament, asserting that “there is no national consensus on this amendment; this Parliament was formed through a flawed election.” He also warned that the new constitutional courts are unnecessary, describing them as a “warehouse” for cases that will primarily involve disputes between the public and the government.
Opposition members attended the Senate session wearing black armbands in protest.
The Tehreek-e-Tahafuz Ayeen-e-Pakistan (TTAP), a multi-party opposition alliance, had announced a nationwide protest movement against the amendment.
“Democratic institutions have been paralysed within Pakistan… the nation must step up against the [proposed] 27th Amendment,” Majlis Wahdat-e-Muslimeen (MWM) chief Allama Raja Nasir Abbas said in a statement.
MWM is part of the TTAP along with the PTI of jailed former prime minister Imran Khan. The alliance also includes the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP), the Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) and the Sunni Ittehad Council (SIC).
PkMAP Chief Mahmood Khan Achakzai said that the nationwide movement would begin on Sunday.
“Our slogan will be ‘Long live democracy’, ‘Down with dictatorship.’ Our third slogan will call for the release of [political] prisoners,” he said.
However, by evening, no protests were held anywhere in the country.
Legal experts are divided over the merits of the amendment, with many believing that the tweaks would, in effect, dethrone the Supreme Court as the country’s highest judicial forum, ceding that position to the proposed Federal Constitutional Court (FCC).
However, proponents of the amendment say the new constitutional court would modernise the judiciary, reduce backlogs and separate constitutional and appellate jurisdictions — a reform they argue will improve efficiency and clarity in the justice system, according to the Dawn newspaper.
“Left with a limited jurisdiction of deciding ordinary civil, criminal and statutory appeals, the Supreme Court has now become all the more a ‘Supreme District Court’,” a senior counsel told Dawn.
According to former additional attorney general Tariq Mehmood Khokhar, the proposed amendment tightens executive control over the superior judiciary through expanded powers to transfer high court judges, and establish an FCC “empowered by disempowering the Supreme Court.” It also formally vests the office of Chief of the Defence Forces in the Chief of the Army Staff and constitutionally guarantees the Field Marshal rank for life, he said.
Another lawyer, also speaking on condition of anonymity, said that although the senior-most of the two chiefs would chair the Judicial Commission of Pakistan, “for all other purposes, the FCC will be in the commanding position.” He also noted that under the amended Article 175A, the chief justice of the FCC is listed before the chief justice of the Supreme Court and will have a longer tenure, retiring at 68, compared to the current retirement age of 65 for Supreme Court judges.
In contrast, senior counsel Hafiz Ahsaan Ahmad Khokhar welcomed the initiative, calling the proposed 27th Amendment “a major and long-awaited structural shift” in the justice system.
He said the creation of two separate apex courts — the existing Supreme Court dealing primarily with appellate functions, and a new FCC with exclusive jurisdiction over constitutional interpretation, inter-governmental disputes and matters arising under Article 199 — reflected “a forward-looking reform model.” This division, he argued, would provide “greater clarity, efficiency and constitutional coherence.” Khokhar said the amendments to Article 243 were in line with “modern constitutional democracies,” with a unified advisory framework under a principal military adviser answerable to the prime minister, the defence minister and the National Security Committee.
The newly elected Supreme Court Bar Association President Haroonur Rasheed supported the idea of setting up an FCC.
(Disclaimer: This report has been published as part of the auto-generated syndicate wire feed. Apart from the headline, no editing has been done in the copy by ABP Live.)
