Dams’ fund created for people’s awareness: ex-CJP

KARACHI: Former Chief Justice of Pakistan Mian Saqib Nisar said that he created Diamer Bhasha and Mohmand dams fund to create awareness about the looming water crisis in the country. He claimed that he would have chosen to be a bank employee if Pakistan did not exist.

The first and foremost precondition for a country’s progress is a consolidated judiciary. This was stated by Mian Saqib Nisar, former Chief Justice of Pakistan. He expressed these views as the chief guest at a breakfast gathering at a local hotel on Sunday. The large gathering comprised intellectuals and business elite of the city.

Justice Saqib Nisar posed the question, “Have we in Pakistan done anything for the creation of laws?” The law of contracts was the same as enacted in 1872 and if it was not delivering today, there obviously had been a lapse. Laws have to be upgraded and attuned to the changing conditions.

He cited the pivotal role education has to play in bringing about an advanced, contented society. Lamenting the country’s lackadaisical performance in this regard, he said, “Have we been able to produce anything like Harvard or Cambridge?” Education, he said, was the engine that fueled progress.

He cited the example of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) who enjoined upon his followers to attain knowledge. He also cited the example of Napoleon Bonaparte who instructed his armies when they conquered another land not to kill anybody who had taken refuge in the home of a teacher.

Another imperative was an honest political leadership, he said. The quality of leadership should be such that leaders should be honest, upright, imbued with wisdom, and engender credibility.

Another ingredient of progress, he said, was accountability. Both the high and mighty, and the common folk should volunteer to be scrutinized by the accountability process. They must volunteer to make themselves accountable for acts of commission or omission. The accountability process must be absolutely transparent.

Another equally important factor, he said, was the ‘Nizam-e-Adl’ (the system of justice). In this regard, he said, the rule of equality was the crux of the law. He said, “No system advocates the rule of equality more than Islam. The day we instill the rule of equality in our system, we’d see a rapid change for the better.”

He said that none could dispense justice better than a judge. A sound justice system was imperative to a country’s progress. Consolidating our institutions was the need of the day, he said.

He lamented that we’d not adapted to new conditions. "Corruption is a termite that has rendered the society hollow,” he said. The government, he said, had to frame appropriate policies in all sectors. While we are always talking about foreign investment “when an overseas investor wants to invest in Pakistan, he will, first of all take stock of the judicial system, the laws, to ensure that his investment will not in any way be jeopardized.”

He said that he had been visiting Karachi very often but of late, he found the city proliferated with hoardings which blighted its beauty. So he took action and had the hoardings removed. He said that even in case of water, he got a barrage of reports that apart from the water shortage, the water being supplied to citizens was highly polluted. So, he said, the first thing he did was to ban the building of high rises in the city, as continued building of high rises would have exacerbated the water problem.

Dwelling on the aspect of pollution, he said that the multiplicity of Nullahs in the city was an environmental hazard. Going outside the city’s borders, he said that the River Ravi in Lahore was now a “Ganda Nullah”. He recalled the time when he, as a student, went rowing in the Ravi but said now things were tragically different.

Reverting to the laws, Justice Nisar said the right to dignity was a basic fundamental right and in this regard, he cited the example of a parliamentarian who had the audacity to stop a car in the middle of heavy traffic and fling a slap across the occupant’s face. “Nobody has a right to ride roughshod over another person’s dignity”, he said, and added that the man had been fined by the judiciary and had to tender an unconditional apology.

Emphasising the need for public debate on issues, he said that in principle he was not against the 18th Amendment but its passage was confined to just one room. There was no public debate or debate in the legislature on the issue. Hence, he said the confusion as regards control over the Jinnah Post-Graduate Medical Centre (JPMC), which was recently seen.

Talking about the state of the judiciary, he said, “Judiciary in Pakistan is totally independent -- no two opinions about it." His talk, which for the most part was delivered in Urdu, was followed by an animated question-answer session. One of the questioners asked the ex-CJP if he planned to come into politics or any other public forum, Justice Nisar replied, “I have no political ambitions.”

When his attention was drawn to a news item in a section of the press to the effect that he had said that he had elicited donations for the Diamer-Basha and Mohmand Dams just to create an awareness among the people about the environmental degradation and water scarcity, he said that obviously there had been miscommunication, and reiterated most emphatically, “The funds collected will be utilized only -- and only -- for building the dams. Nothing else.”

Earlier, Ms. Huma Baqai, Secretary-General, Karachi Council on Foreign Affairs, said that what the country really needed was the need for honest brokerage and for that Justice Nisar was just the right person.