An Open Letter To The Chief Justice!

[Silent Spectator]

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CHIEF JUSTICE
By Tasneem Noorani

[The writer is a former federal secretary. This article first appeared in The News International on April 23, 2009. ]

Honorable Chief Justice of Pakistan, Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, I have no words to describe what you have achieved for this country, through your grit and determination. In the last 60 odd years of our history, we have had a few good men on the bench, who have had the guts to differ with the powers that be. But most, to my memory, acted along the lines of the adage that 'discretion is the better part of valor'. Most conscientious objectors chose to sideline themselves rather than take the dictator head-on, like you did.

This act of yours and the subsequent successful struggle has not only given us the first good news in a long while, it has also set the bar for your successor who should (I hope) find it difficult to go lower than that.

My Lord, your defiance and determination, displayed over a period of two years has galvanized a noble profession i.e. the legal community into such a monolithic and upright force that we have now a new pillar in our scheme of things, which I'm sure will stand up and support any underdog in the future, who shows courage for a righteous cause like you did.

My Lord, like you the nation has to be eternally grateful to all the lawyers and the leaders who suffered but kept this movement alive until the ultimate victory, against all odds. In the process, they have written a new standard operating procedure (SOP) for the future generation to follow in case anyone attempts to roughshod the country again. Like an SOP had been developed for taking over this country by moving the 111 brigade and making a TV speech, you have now introduced the counter SOP on how to unseat and frustrate a usurper through non violent means.

My Lord, even though there have been critics who claimed that the lawyers movement had politicized you and therefore taken your high moral ground away, I'm of the contrary view. I think you conducted yourself impeccably honorably throughout and only spoke of the rule of law etc through the lawyers' convention, which was within the ambit of your duties.

My Lord, you have washed all the abominable black spots for our judiciary, of the past 60 years, starting from the buckling down of Justice Muneer, which had set a trend only to be broken by you. Your role model is even inspiring the bureaucracy, as evidenced by the refusal of the SP Gujranwala to obey orders, which according to his conscience were illegal and unethical.

For the final push to the movement we all have to be grateful to our second most popular political party, who not only helped in achieving the objectives of the lawyer's movement, but also helped themselves in popularity, in the process.

My Lord, having said this entire road ahead of you in extremely bumpy and winding. Expectations from you border on the unrealistic. While the poor and downtrodden are expecting individual relief, the more discerning expect you to punish the usurper, expose and take to task the mega corrupt and bring sanity to the arbitrary demeanor of the establishment.

But obviously you cannot bite more than you can chew. Regardless of the expectations of the public It will be prudent to proceed with caution. Your foremost challenge will be to put your own house in order, which has intentionally been filled with all sorts of people, in order to make your task difficult. In case you handle the matter in a cool and dispassionate manner, I can assure you, My Lord, that the reputation that you have built over the past 2 years will precede you and sort matters out for you.

In due course, after you have settled down, the usurpers and their abettors have to be held to account so that any future adventurer may be forced to think twice before striking.

At the operational level, your biggest challenge is going to be streamlining and rejuvenation the lower judiciary for which not only will the masses be eternally grateful to you ,but in the process we will prevent more Swats from happening.

My Lord, if in the process of achieving all this if you have to face arbitrariness once more ,fear not, because the public and the legal community will stand by you with greater determination again, because they know that there are no short cuts to coming out of the morass we are in.
[Courtesy The News]

Regards..