The way Qazi Faiz Isa was harassed and his subsequent honorable victory in the Supreme Court proves that those who call the shots in Pakistan are no longer immune from accountability.
He is the judge who named the main culprits involved in destabilizing the previous government. They had got the foul-mouthed militant cleric Khadim Hussain Rizvi to stage a dharna in Faizabad. When the strike was over, a brigadier was filmed handing over money to the demonstrators. The establishment was irked that a judge had the audacity to openly criticize it for indulging in illegal acts. So they went all out to get disgrace him. But instead of following the proper procedure, they got a reference filed against him in the Supreme Judicial Council. No doubt Imran Khan thought the judge is as corrupt as most politicians are. He heard that the judge's wife owned properties abroad, concluding that it must have been the judge who had given her the money to buy assets in foreign countries.
The court rightly held that this was a case for the federal agencies to handle. If corruption was done, the FIA should have been asked to handle it. The FBR too could have been told to investigate if any financial laws were broken.
It's important to note that the prosecutor (Farogh Naseem) is a lawyer with links to a disgraced politician who lives in exile in London and whose name is never mentioned by the media. He is referred to as the founder of MQM, the political party which had the support of the establishment in the past.
One hopes the powers that be realize from this that they are not so powerful, that they too can be held accountable for their actions. Today's decision by the apex court has taken us another step towards rule of law in the country.
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