Pakistan's deposed judge gets hero's welcome on tour

By Kamran Haider

QUETTA, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistan's deposed top judge who has became a focus for opposition to President Pervez Musharraf got a hero's welcome in his hometown of Quetta on Monday at the beginning of a tour of the country to meet lawyers.

Former Supreme Court chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and nine colleagues were freed from nearly five months of house arrest in Islamabad last week on the orders of new Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani.

"Now there is realization that there should be a law, constitution. There should not be one man rule," Chaudhry said in a speech to the legal fraternity in the capital of Pakistan's southwest province of Baluchistan as a reception for the judge extended long into the night.

Chaudhry and dozens of his colleagues seen as hostile to former army chief Musharraf's re-election as president in October were dismissed in early November when Musharraf imposed a six-week period of emergency rule and suspended the constitution.

Chaudhry said regardless of Musharraf's action they were still the rightful judges, and the result of the February 18 election showed whose side the people were on.

"We're judges according to the constitution and we have recognition of 160 million people of Pakistan," he said.

When the judge arrived at Quetta's small airport around 500 political activists waving party flags and black-suited lawyers greeted him with shouts of "long live the chief justice" and "Go Musharraf, go". More showered him with rose petals as he came out of the airport terminal.

Security was tight with police, including members of an anti-terrorist force, armed with automatic rifles standing by and at least three armored personnel carriers at the airport.

COUNTDOWN

The opposition parties of assassinated former prime minister Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif dealt allies of the unpopular Musharraf a stunning defeat in February 18 parliamentary elections and are setting up a coalition government led by Gilani.

Leaders of the two parties, Bhutto's widower Asif Ali Zardari and Sharif, have promised to reinstate Chaudhry and his colleagues through a parliamentary resolution within 30 days of forming a government.

But that is likely to trigger a showdown between the new government and the president, who will be worried the judges, if reinstated, would take up legal challenges to him that could see his October re-election ruled unconstitutional.

Aitzaz Ahsan, a fierce critic of Musharraf and Chaudhry's main lawyer, said Chaudhry's supporters would not organize protests to press for Chaudhry's reinstatement but would wait for the government to keep its promise to reappoint the judges.

"If the judges are restored within 30 days then the movement will obviously end. But if not, this movement will continue," said Ahsan who accompanied Chaudhry with about two dozen other supporters on his trip to Quetta.

Chaudhry plans to tour the country to meet lawyers over the next month.