Pakistan's Opposition parties and human rights groups fear it could be a move by Musharraf to put off this year's expected general elections and impose emergency.
ISLAMABAD: Terming the sacking of Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Iftikar Muhammad Chaudhry as a "judicial coup", Pakistan's Opposition parties and human rights groups fear it could be a move by President Pervez Musharraf to put off this year's expected general elections and impose emergency.
"It is a judicial coup and an indication that the Musharraf regime could not swallow a number of judgement of Justice Chaudhry, specially the privatisation of the steel
mills, which the apex court has nullified," Ahsan Iqbal, spokesperson of the former Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif headed, Pakistan Muslim League-N, (PML-N) told the media.
A PML-N statement described the move as the worst form of "dictatorial terrorism" ever unleashed against the judiciary in the subcontinent. He feared that it could be a
move towards putting-off the general elections due at the end of the year and impose emergency in the country.
"The manner in which the judges of the Supreme Court were terrorised by the presence of police in court premises and the way the chief justice was summoned to the Army House and kept there incommunicado as if he was under arrest while charges against him were read out to him indicated that Musharraf had lost confidence in the judges who took oath under the Provincial Constitutional Order, (PCO) promulgated by him after his coup in 1999," the statement said.
Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly and Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, (MMA) Secretary-General Maulana Fazlur Rahman said: "This step is a blow to the whole system and it needs a thorough review by the combined Opposition in order to adopt a unified stand."
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