Lawyers to field own candidate on Musharraf

Islamabad, Sep 21: Stepping up their campaign against the re-election of President Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan's lawyers announced they would field their own candidate to challenge him in the October 6 presidential election.

Refusing to disclose the candidate, Supreme Court Bar Association president Munir A Malik asserted they would make a senior lawyer contest the presidential election and not let Gen Musharraf get elected unopposed, the Nation today reported.

Lawyers would surround the Election Commission's office on September 29 when the scrutiny of nomination papers of President Musharraf will take place, he said at a press conference here at the library of the Supreme Court yesterday, asserting they would try their best to foil the process of filing of nomination papers of Gen Musharraf and besiege the office of the Election Commission.

He said the bar associations across the country will hold protest meetings and demonstrations on September 29 in their respective areas.

The SCBA president claimed the government was bent upon completing the presidential election as soon as possible and might try to file the nomination papers of Gen Musharraf ''secretly'' but they would not let that happen by surrounding the office of the Election Commission.

Senior lawyers of the Supreme Court, including Chaudhry Aitzaz Ahsan, Hamid Khan and former vice chairman of the Pakistan Bar Council Ali Ahmed Kurd, were also present at the press conference.

Chaudhry Aitzaz vowed to continue the struggle for the independence of the judiciary.

UNI