February 17, 2008	Sunday	Safar 09, 1429

ISLAMABAD, Feb 16: Caretaker Minister for Human Rights Ansar Burney on Saturday formally asked the government to let deposed chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry and detained lawyers to vote in the general election.

The minister made the demand in his meeting with caretaker Minister for Interior Lt-Gen (retd) Hamid Nawaz in what could be a test case for the weight of a caretaker minister’s views.

The issue is apparently of a human rights interest, but practically it could mean nothing because all the sacked judges and detained lawyers are expected to follow the call of bar councils and associations to boycott the elections. Even otherwise a departure of the deposed chief justice to vote in his home province of Balochistan could be a great relief to the authorities who seek to get the vacation of his official residence which he is keeping even after his sacking on Nov 3 under the controversial decision of President Musharraf to impose emergency in the country.

According to a handout, Mr Burney has taken “serious notice” of the complaints by senior advocates that senior members of the lawyers community, including deposed chief justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, president of the Supreme Court Bar Association Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan, Ali Ahmed Kurd and Justice (retd) Tariq Mehmood may not be allowed to cast their votes.

It claims that the interior minister had assured Mr Burney that “necessary arrangements would definitely be made”.

Mr Burney in his letter stated that this was a matter of human rights and “all four persons must be allowed to cast their votes no matter what their status of detention”.