• Justice Mansoor, lawyers, ex-judges in two letters urge CJP to take a stand; Justice Minallah also writes letter
• Senior puisne judge asks CJ Afridi to play role as guardian of judiciary, confront executive on 27th Amendment
ISLAMABAD: As parliament moves to reshape the judiciary through the controversial 27th Amendment, two Supreme Court judges, in addition to several lawyers and former judges, have requested Chief Justice of Pakistan Yahya Afridi to play his role and act as the guardian of the judiciary’s independence.
Senior puisne judge Mansoor Ali Shah, in a six-page letter, described the proposed amendment as a political device to weaken the judiciary and urged CJP Afridi to confront the executive to lay down a rule that no amendments affecting the judiciary be adopted without prior consultations with superior judges.
“You [CJP] act not merely as its administrator but as its guardian,” Justice Shah said while also requesting a full court meeting or preferably a joint convention of all constitutional court judges, including the Federal Shariat Court (FSC) and high courts, to articulate the judiciary’s collective stance.
Besides Justice Shah, Justice Athar Minallah also wrote a seven-page letter along similar lines, but its content could not be known. Senior lawyer Faisal Siddiqui, in a two-page letter endorsed by ex-judges, also asked the CJP to take a stand.
Justice Syed Mansoor Ali Shah emphasised that this moment demanded leadership, transparency and institutional resolve. If such consultation is not initiated under CJ’s stewardship, it will inevitably be seen as acquiescence and an abdication of the trust reposed in the high office, he added.
In his letter, Justice Shah also questioned the justification for creating the proposed Federal Constitutional Court (FCC), asking what constitutional vacuum it would seek to fill. The proposed FCC does not arise from any genuine reform agenda, and its judges will be appointed without any constitutional parameters, as was the case with the Constitutional Bench (CB), the letter said, adding that such an arrangement vested decisive power in the executive and invited manipulation of the judicial process. A court may serve transient political interests, but it will permanently damage the republic, he added.
The independence of the judiciary is not a privilege of judges; it is the people’s protection against arbitrary power. “This moment demands that you [CJP], as head of the institution, raise the alarm before the independence of the judiciary is irretrievably lost,” the letter urged.
The letter emphasised that there was no structural void or historical necessity to justify the creation of FCC over and above the SC. Importing the continental model into Pakistan’s integrated common-law framework is not reform – it is constitutional incoherence, the letter stressed.
The proposal for FCC in the Charter of Democracy 2006, the letter said, was envisioned only for a limited duration of six years in a very specific historical context — the military rule of Gen Pervez Musharraf — when civilian political forces sought to restore balance among the state institutions. Nearly two decades later, without implementation, the charter’s temporal vision has lapsed.
To now cite that temporary idea as justification for permanent changes in the judiciary is historically and constitutionally misplaced. This question too demands open consultation with the judiciary and a transparent explanation to the public, the letter said.
To say that a separate FCC was essential for constitutional adjudication was unfounded, the letter said, adding that strong and independent judiciaries around the world effectively discharge both constitutional and appellate jurisdictions without such a parallel court.
The real solution lies not in creating another apex forum but in ensuring that the existing court is equipped with independence, competent and adequately supported judges, the letter emphasised.
Pending cases
On pendency, the letter cited the Law and Justice Commission of Pakistan (LJCP) 2023 judicial statistics, saying that Pakistan had 2.26 million pending cases, of which nearly 82 per cent were before the district judiciary, while the Supreme Court accounted for less than three per cent of the total. The overwhelming burden of delay lies at the base, not at the apex of the judicial pyramid.
Despite the creation of constitutional benches under the 26th Amendment, national pendency has remained virtually unchanged, confirming that structural tinkering at the top does not address systemic backlog.
If reduction of pendency is indeed the government’s objective, reform must focus on the district judiciary – fulfilling vacancies, strengthening case management, institutionalising alternative dispute resolution and ensuring data-driven accountability.
‘Greatest threat’
Meanwhile, Faisal Siddiqui said the missive was being written not in normal times but in times that presented the greatest threat to the Supreme Court since its establishment in 1956.
In case, this request was declined on the “pretext of neutrality or noninterference with legislation, then we would at least expect the CJ to accept and admit in a written response to us that he was now reconciled to be the last chief justice of Pakistan and now reconciled to accept the demise of the Supreme Court of Pakistan as the highest court in Pakistan”.“At least by this admission by you, we would no longer have any kind of expectation from your Lordship to be a defender of the Supreme Court,” the letter said.
The letter was endorsed and signed by former retired judges and senior lawyers, namely Mushir Alam, Nadeem Akhtar, Muneer A. Malik, Muhammad Akram Sheikh etc, and requested a prompt full court meeting.
Published in Dawn, November 11th, 2025
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