While Christians fear that government compliance with Pakistan’s Federal Shariat Court’s (FSC) order given on December 4 to remove life imprisonment as a punishment for insulting Muhammad could usher in a new era of persecution, some critics said the greater concern is that it could broaden the powers of the controversial court.
Section 295-C of Pakistan’s blasphemy laws calls for either death or life imprisonment for persons convicted of insulting Muhammad. The FSC has given the government a ‘couple of months’ to implement, through parliament, the order to remove life imprisonment as a possible punishment. The FSC order comes less than three years after assassinations of two government officials silenced most criticism of the blasphemy laws.
Symbolic significance only?
While it could further encourage extremists to attack those they believe are insulting Muhammad, the FSC order may have little specific legal impact, since judges have tended to issue death-penalty sentences for such convictions, according to Yasser Latif Hamdani, who practises law in superior courts.
‘This is a guideline that the courts have already followed’, Hamdani said. ‘The problem is that it has symbolic significance. It opens the door for the FSC to exercise greater influence on the legal system.’
Hamdani said he hoped that the order would land before the Supreme Court’s Shariat Appellate Bench, ‘which may take a more positive and liberal view’, he said.
Attorney Shoaib Salim, of the Lahore High Court, also expressed hope that it could be reversed. ‘The FSC is only empowered to examine and determine whether the laws of the country comply with shari’a or not’, Salim said. ‘The ultimate decision rests with the parliament.’
He said it was unlikely that the government would implement an order that would further incite religious hatred and persecution in Pakistani society. The blasphemy laws have been routinely abused to settle personal vendettas, as antagonists can easily level false accusations that ruin lives.
Critics say the FSC merely duplicates the functions of superior courts and contravenes the authority of parliament. They allege that the way its judges are appointed and retained is tainted and that the court does not fully meet criterion for an independent judiciary.
The former Punjab Governor was gunned down by his own police bodyguard in January 2011 for calling for a review of the blasphemy laws and giving moral support to a woman sentenced to death for alleged blasphemy. Two months later, Shahbaz Bhatti, Federal Minister for Minority Affairs, was assassinated in Islamabad. Members of the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility.
False accusations
In September, after much lobbying, Pakistan Ulema Council chairman Allama Tahir Ashrafi strove to make the country’s top religious body, the Council of Islamic Ideology (CII), recommend the death sentence for those making false blasphemy accusations. Ashrafi believes that such a law was necessary as a deterrent.
Hardliners in the CII, however, shot down Ashrafi’s initiative. ‘I have been relentlessly protesting the misuse of the blasphemy laws’, Ashrafi said. ‘This is not only bringing a bad name to Pakistan, but also to the entire Muslim Ummah [community]. It’s a pity that the other religious leaders failed to understand the importance of a strong deterrent for false accusers. Those making a false accusation needed to face the death penalty because the words attributed to the accused were actually uttered by the accuser.’
CII chairman Maulana Muhammad Khan Sheerani said a majority of the CII members believed there was no need to amend the blasphemy laws. ‘We don’t want to discourage people from coming forward and lodging complaints against blasphemers’, he said. ‘There’s already a law – Section 194 of the Pakistan Penal Code – which envisages punishments for lodging a false [accusation].’
