Re: CJ stopped Mush & Shaukat from billion $ fraud
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/05/25/news/Pakistan-Politics.php
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan: Pakistan’s deposed chief justice said Sunday that officials who bowed to President Pervez Musharraf’s declaration of emergency rule and ouster of judges last year would be “punished.”
Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry made the comments in the city of Faisalabad, where thousands of lawyers and other activists gathered to whip up support for a new round of protests aimed at pressuring the country’s new coalition government to restore the jurists.
Musharraf, a retired army chief who seized power in a 1999 military coup, declared emergency rule in November and ousted several dozen judges to avoid legal challenges to his rule.
Anti-Musharraf parties came to power after winning February elections, forming a coalition that promised to restore the judges. But disputes over exactly how to bring the judges back have pushed the coalition to the verge of collapse.
Chaudhry told the lawyers in Faisalabad that the Supreme Court had passed an order aimed at countering the president’s actions on Nov. 3, the same day the emergency was declared.
In an apparent reference to Musharraf and the judges he installed after the purge, Chaudhry promised that anyone who violated the court’s order “will be punished no matter how big he is and whatever position he is attaining.”
Chaudhry did not specify what he meant by punishment.
The heated rhetoric came hours after the main ruling Pakistan People’s Party offered some details of a plan to reinstate the judges and change the constitution in order to reduce Musharraf’s powers.
Party chief Asif Ali Zardari said he wanted to strip Musharraf of the right to dissolve the country’s parliament and to appoint military chiefs. But he also said Saturday he would “engage the presidency” to smooth the passage of the provisions.
“We have never accepted Musharraf as a constitutional president but always said that we will keep a working relationship,” Zardari said, adding, “We intend to walk him away rather than impeach him away.”
On Sunday, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani — a Zardari party member — said the proposed package was not aimed at setting up a clash with the president.
“Its objective is to balance the discrepancies. … Confrontation with anyone is not our job,” Gilani told journalists in the city of Lahore, noting that previous amendments to the constitution had strengthened the presidency.
Musharraf’s spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment Sunday.
Sadiqul Farooq, a spokesman for the second-largest party in the government, that of ex-Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, said it would reserve comment on the package until it sees details.
Associated Press Writers Khalid Tanveer in Faisalabad and Sadaqat Jan in Islamabad contributed to this article.