Daily Times

A special court hearing treason charges against General (retd) Pervez Musharraf on Tuesday ordered authorities to freeze the former president’s back accounts and confiscate his property over his non-appearance before the court despite repeated notices. A three-member bench of the special court headed by Chief Justice Peshawar High Court Justice Mazhar Alam Miankhel passed the orders. The court also adjourned the hearing of the case until the former president surrenders himself or is arrested. On the issue Justice Miankhel said, “According to law, the accused cannot be trialled in absentia”. He also remarked that the attitude of the accused left no other option for the court. Musharraf, who is is facing a number of cases including Abdul Rasheed Ghazi murder case, Benazir Bhutto murder case and judges’ detention case, left for Dubai in March after the Ministry of Interior issued a notification to remove his name from the exit control list.

Musharraf was formally charged with treason on April 2014 for imposing Emergency and the Provisional Constitutional Order on November 3, 2007. But the issue of treating ex-CJP Abdul Hameed Dogar, then Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and then Law Minister Zahid Hamid as co-accused delayed the trial. Meanwhile, Musharraf on February 25 went to the Supreme Court, seeking one-time permission to go abroad for medical treatment.

The poor condition of the justice system in Pakistan can be gauged from the fact that it let Musharraf fly overseas in the first place and later issued his arrest warrants despite knowing the fact that he is not in the country anymore. The treason case against Musharraf was delayed for over a year due to different reasons. Since there is no guarantee that Musharraf will return to face the authorities in court, any such efforts will be of no use.

The orders of the court coincide with allegations of Musharraf possessing multi-million dollar Swiss accounts. Amid such reports, the court orders are not more than mere eyewash. Along with freezing of Musharraf’s local accounts, an inquiry should be held into his alleged holdings in Swiss accounts too.

There is no argument against trying Musharraf for the cases he is accused of but what needs pondering are the loopholes in the justice system of the country that allow accused individuals to find safe passages. It is highly unlikely that Musharraf will return to Pakistan as the courts have issued his arrest warrants in different cases. Moreover, since the court has also adjourned the proceedings till Musharraf returns to the country or gets arrested, and with his bank accounts frozen and political future looking bleak, there is hardly any incentive left for the retired general to return to Pakistan. All this shows that reforms in the judicial system of the country are the only way to avoid any lapses in similar cases in the future. *