On the eve of October 2024, the Parliament of Pakistan approved the 26th Constitutional Amendment. It was a sudden, careless, and intentionally non-transparent shift, and even seasoned lawyers remained confused in the beginning with its extent. What became obvious soon was that the move was not about reform, but control. The main focus was the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), a party that has made its own constitutional negligence its weapon, now turned against its own future.
A Party Without a Brain Trust
The unavoidable conclusion, however, is that the PPP did not, and cannot, write this amendment alone. Such complex work demands the institutional competence and legal know-how of the party. It has, through the years, become a hollow organisation – popular in rhetoric, thin in thought. The 26th Amendment is too narrowly focused on judicial independence to have been cooked up in the political gears of the PPP. It carries the impressions of external control constructed by superior powers and executed by docile performers. PPP has now brought a constitutional virus into the Pakistani democratic process in its attempt to gain short-term leverage against the courts, already undermining the judiciary, and eventually, probably, working against the party that promoted it.
The Core of the Amendment: Undermining the Judiciary
The 26th Amendment has one goal: the diminishing of judicial independence. It reforms the Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP) by reducing the influence of senior judges and adding political nominees of the Parliament, making the judiciary unimportant and the legislature and the executive significant in terms of appointments. It substitutes the seniority system of appointing the Chief Justice with a 12-member parliamentary body that appoints the head of the judiciary in the absence of clear criteria, accountability, and transparency. It also results in providing indistinct reasons to dismiss judges, like inefficiency, which is such a loose term that it can be applied to virtually anything or nothing.
The Aftermath: Chaos in the Courts
The consequences have been immediate and severe. Leadership vacuums opened in major High Courts, including Sindh, Peshawar, and Islamabad, which operated for months without permanent Chief Justices. This was not a routine delay; it flowed from the Judicial Commission’s failure to convene and the new parliamentary structure’s failure to act. In Sindh, the absence of a Chief Justice crippled the administration. Peshawar and Islamabad suffered the same limbo, relying on acting heads and stalled case management. What had been a predictable seniority-based system of appointments is now stuck in political bargaining and bureaucratic paralysis.
Politicisation then marked one of the first major tests: the appointment of the Chief Justice of Pakistan. A parliamentary committee bypassed two senior and widely respected judges – Justice Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Munib Akhtar – and chose Justice Yahya Afridi, third in line by seniority. The reaction was swift. Public criticism surged. Legal challenges followed. The Supreme Court Bar Association called the process unconstitutional, while opposition parties accused the PPP and its partners of stacking the courts with loyalists. A settled tradition of seniority gave way to open political preference.
The restructuring also produced a predictable surge in backlog. More than 10,000 constitutional petitions in the Supreme Court fell into limbo. Over 20,000 cases across the High Courts were halted or delayed pending the establishment of new ‘constitutional benches.’ Experts now estimate that cases already on the docket before the amendment may be delayed for five to seven years. Instead of speeding or improving justice, the 26th Amendment has trapped it in administrative quicksand.
The new constitutional benches were meant to handle sensitive matters more effectively. In practice, without the necessary infrastructure, staffing, or procedures, the concept became another choke point. Cases that once would have moved forward now wait for bench formation, a process clouded by ambiguity and gridlock. As one lawyer observed, ‘They created a new car without building the road first.’
Most damaging has been the erosion of public trust. Judges are increasingly perceived as political appointees rather than neutral decision-makers. Citizens and lawyers question the integrity of courts already burdened by delay and interference. International bodies, including the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), have condemned the amendment as a ‘blow to the rule of law.’ This is no longer a mere legal critique; it is a reputational crisis for Pakistan’s judiciary.
The PPP’s Miscalculation: A Weapon Turned Inward
PPP did not simply miscalculate. It fashioned a tool that may undo it. By trading judicial independence for political convenience, the party has invited future governments to repeat or escalate the same practice. What was imagined as a tightening of control is more like striking a match in a room filled with gas. Without a neutral judiciary, Pakistan’s political system is more exposed to authoritarian overreach and elite capture. When the political tide changes, as it always does, PPP may face the very weapon it helped create.
From Constitutional Farce to Democratic Crisis
The 26th Amendment is not reform; it is a constitutional ambush. It breaks precedent, weakens the courts, clogs the arteries of justice, and sets Pakistan on a path toward legal disorder. Although PPP carried it forward, the design and intent likely lie elsewhere, in darker corridors of the state. The warning is straightforward: when parliaments act as courts and judges become politicians, the idea of justice collapses. The judiciary is no longer independent; it is compromised, confused, and increasingly controlled. Unless the amendment is repealed or radically revised, the damage may endure. In the end, PPP may find itself before a judge it helped install, inside a system it helped weaken, asking for justice in a house it helped set on fire.
The writer is a lawyer specialising in human rights, with a practice dedicated to representing and advising NGOs.
Pakistan’s 26th Amendment: PPP’s Political Suicide and the Judiciary’s Collapse
On the eve of October 2024, the Parliament of Pakistan approved the 26th Constitutional Amendment. It was a sudden, careless, and intentionally non-transparent shift, and even seasoned lawyers remained confused in the beginning with its extent. What became obvious soon was that the move was not about reform, but control. The main focus was the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), a party that has made its own constitutional negligence its weapon, now turned against its own future.
A Party Without a Brain Trust
The unavoidable conclusion, however, is that the PPP did not, and cannot, write this amendment alone. Such complex work demands the institutional competence and legal know-how of the party. It has, through the years, become a hollow organisation – popular in rhetoric, thin in thought. The 26th Amendment is too narrowly focused on judicial independence to have been cooked up in the political gears of the PPP. It carries the impressions of external control constructed by superior powers and executed by docile performers. PPP has now brought a constitutional virus into the Pakistani democratic process in its attempt to gain short-term leverage against the courts, already undermining the judiciary, and eventually, probably, working against the party that promoted it.
The Core of the Amendment: Undermining the Judiciary
The 26th Amendment has one goal: the diminishing of judicial independence. It reforms the Judicial Commission of Pakistan (JCP) by reducing the influence of senior judges and adding political nominees of the Parliament, making the judiciary unimportant and the legislature and the executive significant in terms of appointments. It substitutes the seniority system of appointing the Chief Justice with a 12-member parliamentary body that appoints the head of the judiciary in the absence of clear criteria, accountability, and transparency. It also results in providing indistinct reasons to dismiss judges, like inefficiency, which is such a loose term that it can be applied to virtually anything or nothing.
The Aftermath: Chaos in the Courts
The consequences have been immediate and severe. Leadership vacuums opened in major High Courts, including Sindh, Peshawar, and Islamabad, which operated for months without permanent Chief Justices. This was not a routine delay; it flowed from the Judicial Commission’s failure to convene and the new parliamentary structure’s failure to act. In Sindh, the absence of a Chief Justice crippled the administration. Peshawar and Islamabad suffered the same limbo, relying on acting heads and stalled case management. What had been a predictable seniority-based system of appointments is now stuck in political bargaining and bureaucratic paralysis.
Politicisation then marked one of the first major tests: the appointment of the Chief Justice of Pakistan. A parliamentary committee bypassed two senior and widely respected judges – Justice Mansoor Ali Shah and Justice Munib Akhtar – and chose Justice Yahya Afridi, third in line by seniority. The reaction was swift. Public criticism surged. Legal challenges followed. The Supreme Court Bar Association called the process unconstitutional, while opposition parties accused the PPP and its partners of stacking the courts with loyalists. A settled tradition of seniority gave way to open political preference.
The restructuring also produced a predictable surge in backlog. More than 10,000 constitutional petitions in the Supreme Court fell into limbo. Over 20,000 cases across the High Courts were halted or delayed pending the establishment of new ‘constitutional benches.’ Experts now estimate that cases already on the docket before the amendment may be delayed for five to seven years. Instead of speeding or improving justice, the 26th Amendment has trapped it in administrative quicksand.
The new constitutional benches were meant to handle sensitive matters more effectively. In practice, without the necessary infrastructure, staffing, or procedures, the concept became another choke point. Cases that once would have moved forward now wait for bench formation, a process clouded by ambiguity and gridlock. As one lawyer observed, ‘They created a new car without building the road first.’
Most damaging has been the erosion of public trust. Judges are increasingly perceived as political appointees rather than neutral decision-makers. Citizens and lawyers question the integrity of courts already burdened by delay and interference. International bodies, including the International Commission of Jurists (ICJ), have condemned the amendment as a ‘blow to the rule of law.’ This is no longer a mere legal critique; it is a reputational crisis for Pakistan’s judiciary.
The PPP’s Miscalculation: A Weapon Turned Inward
PPP did not simply miscalculate. It fashioned a tool that may undo it. By trading judicial independence for political convenience, the party has invited future governments to repeat or escalate the same practice. What was imagined as a tightening of control is more like striking a match in a room filled with gas. Without a neutral judiciary, Pakistan’s political system is more exposed to authoritarian overreach and elite capture. When the political tide changes, as it always does, PPP may face the very weapon it helped create.
From Constitutional Farce to Democratic Crisis
The 26th Amendment is not reform; it is a constitutional ambush. It breaks precedent, weakens the courts, clogs the arteries of justice, and sets Pakistan on a path toward legal disorder. Although PPP carried it forward, the design and intent likely lie elsewhere, in darker corridors of the state. The warning is straightforward: when parliaments act as courts and judges become politicians, the idea of justice collapses. The judiciary is no longer independent; it is compromised, confused, and increasingly controlled. Unless the amendment is repealed or radically revised, the damage may endure. In the end, PPP may find itself before a judge it helped install, inside a system it helped weaken, asking for justice in a house it helped set on fire.
The writer is a lawyer specialising in human rights, with a practice dedicated to representing and advising NGOs.
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