Another case of the slows

Consider this case from the Supreme Court of Pakistan.

It has been alleged that a great deal of public money was improperly doled out by military officers in connection with the country's 1990 elections.

The allegations were brought to the Supreme Court in 1996.

In 2012, the court directed that the actions of two general officers be investigated. This was not a casual action; the judgment is 141 pages long in the official version. A reformatted version of the judgment, Khan v. Baig, Hum. Rgts. Case No. 19 of 1996 (Pak. 2012), can be found here. It includes this paragraph:

Late Ghulam Ishaq Khan, the then President of Pakistan, General (R) Aslam Beg and General (R) Asad Durrani acted in violation of the Constitution by facilitating a group of politicians and political parties, etc., to ensure their success against the rival candidates in the general election of 1990, for which they secured funds from Mr. Yunus Habib. Their acts have brought a bad name to Pakistan and its Armed Forces as well as secret agencies in the eyes of the nation, therefore, notwithstanding that they may have retired from service, the Federal Government shall take necessary steps under the Constitution and Law against them.

The case came on for hearing again this week. Excerpt from the news report:

On Monday, the Ministry of Defense submitted a report to the court, stating that an inquiry against the military officials, allegedly involved in the matter was under process.

The court then directed the Ministry of Defense to submit within four weeks, progress report on said proceedings and declared that the report submitted by the FIA [Federal Investigation Agency] will be reviewed along with the progress report of Ministry of Defense.

At the outset of hearing, Justice Gulzar Ahmed inquired the attorney general as to why the Ministry of Defense was not initiating action for the court-martial of military officials, involved in the instant matter instead of conducting an inquiry.

The attorney general replied that as per law an inquiry was mandatory before moving to the court-martial proceeding. Justice Ijaz ul Ahsen asked after retirement how much time court-martial process takes.

The attorney general replied that court-martial could be done anytime if it was a matter of fraud or case pertaining to loss to the national kitty. At this, Justice Ijaz ul Ahsen observed that 24 years back some Rs140 million had been spent on Asghar Khan’s case.