Pakistan’s deposed chief justice rallied supporters from house arrest on Thursday, saying the new government should immediately restore judges axed by President Pervez Musharraf during emergency rule. Soon after, police fired tear gas at nearly 100 protesting lawyers in the southern city of Karachi.Rallies also were held in the eastern city of Lahore and the southwestern city of Quetta — highlighting some of the challenges the country’s two top opposition parties will face as they prepare to form a new government following this week’s sweeping election win in parliament.Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry, one of dozens of independent-minded judges who was removed and replaced by Musharraf late last year, has been detained in his Islamabad home since November 3. Though his phone lines have been cut, he got his hands on a smuggled mobile phone and called lawyers gathering in at least two cities.Chaudhry told those rallying at the Sindh High Court Bar Association in Karachi that the Pakistani people had repudiated Musharraf in Monday’s polls and that unconstitutional measures taken by his archrival in recent months should be reversed.“Victory is not far off now,” he said, calling on judges to be immediately restored. Supporters chanted, “Go, Musharraf, go!”Soon after Chaudhry spoke, police fired tear gas at 100 lawyers demanding Musharraf’s ouster. Six of the protesters were arrested for throwing stones at police during the melee outside the city’s main court complex, police official Tahir Naveed said.In Quetta, about 70 lawyers, chanting “Musharraf your rules we do not accept,” rallied in a street outside the main courthouse. About 50 police in full riot gear stood by but there were no incidents. In Lahore, hundreds of lawyers burned an effigy of Musharraf in front of the provincial legislature building in the city.“There are occasions when a nation passes through defining moments and the Pakistani nation is passing through this defining moment now,” Chaudhry told the Lahore lawyers. “If we lose this opportunity no one can then change the affairs of this nation ever.”The leaders of the two top opposition parties were preparing to meet Thursday for the first time since Monday’s election win to discuss the formation of a new government. But they will have to first iron out significant differences - including the future of Musharraf and the restoration of the judiciary.The Pakistan People’s Party of slain former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, now headed by her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, says the parliament should decide on the fate of the embattled president and the deposed judges.But Nawaz Sharif, leader of Pakistan Muslim League-N, says Musharraf should be impeached and the justices immediately reinstated.“If they don’t find common ground, it will be an alliance of fire and water,” said Zafarullah Khan, executive director of Pakistan’s Center for Civic Education.Though the official count has not yet been released, the two parties garnered 154 of the 268 contested seats Monday — with just six results still to be announced, according to Pakistan’s Election Commission. Musharraf’s ruling party came in a dismal third.If the opposition teams up with smaller parties they could seize a two-thirds majority of parliament, leaving the president vulnerable to impeachment eight years after he seized power in a 1999 coup.
