Pervez PervMusharraf
... former dictator of Pakistain, who was less dictatorial and corrupt than any Pak civilian government to date ...
would be tried for treason under Article 6 for the Emergency he clamped on the country on November 3, 2007. For this purpose, the government would have recourse to the Supreme Court (SC) with a request to set up a trial court (not a 'commission' as the minister erroneously said) comprising judges of the high courts. The government also committed to appointing a special prosecutor to conduct the trial. On Monday, the Ministry of Interior reportedly sent a letter to the Ministry of Law to implement the government's decision. These moves followed the receipt by the government of the investigation by the FIA into the matter, a report Chaudhry Nisar said would be submitted to the SC along with its application.
The announcement set off a virtual storm of comment and speculation as to the procedure adopted by the government and its intent. Some rejected the path being taken as unconstitutional, unnecessary, an attempted distraction from the fraught sectarian situation in Rawalpindi and elsewhere in the country, and an attempt to shift the responsibility from the executive (where it belongs) to the judiciary to avoid any adverse fallout from the military.
There were also questions raised about why only the November 3, 2007 Emergency charge was to be pursued and not the (arguably more serious) October 12, 1999 coup in which an elected government was tossed. To the response to this by some circles that the coup was endorsed by parliament and therefore was a closed matter, the objection could legitimately be raised that a parliament packed with the King's Party and Musharraf's political collaborators lacked the inherent legitimacy to provide immunity on the treason charge to the coup maker, apart from such an endorsement falling foul of the constitution.
While Musharraf's front man expectedly trashed the move as vengeful (denied at some length by Chaudhry Nisar earlier), a distraction, and likely to annoy the military, at the time of writing these lines an interesting development was expected in the Sindh High Court (SHC), which had ordered the institution of a treason charge on Musharraf, and where the latter's application for his name to be taken off the Exit Control List (ECL) was up for hearing on Monday. A contempt of court petition had also been filed against the prime minister and the government for their failure to implement the SHC's order to file a treason case against the ex-dictator.