Pakistan’s Supreme Court reinstated the country’s Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry on Friday four months after his suspension by President Pervez Musharraf.
Chaudhry became a symbol of resistance to General Musharraf after refusing to quit in the face of pressure from the president and his intelligence chiefs.
”The reference has been set aside and the chief justice has been reinstated,” Justice Khalil-ur-Rehman Ramday, the head of the 13-member bench, said at the conclusion of the two-month-old case.
Chaudhry’s defiance created the greatest challenge to Musharraf since he came to power in a coup eight years ago, and his reinstatement could create problems for Musharraf’s plans for re-election for a second five-year term in the coming months.
The mish-mash of misconduct charges against Chaudhry included using influence to get his son a job, fiddling petrol expenses and that he had a penchant for expensive cars.
The government filed a statement in the Supreme Court last month in which it also accused Chaudhry of harassing judges, showing bias in appointments and intimidating police and civil servants.
Musharraf’s real motive for trying to get rid of Chaudhry, many critics suspect, was that the judge could allow constitutional challenges to his plans to get re-elected by current assemblies before they are dissolved for a general election at the end of the year.
Opposition parties may also challenge Musharraf’s right to stand for a second term while still army chief, a post he is constitutionally obliged to give up by the end of the year. – Reuters