16th Amendment
Govt seeks stay on HC order
The government yesterday filed an appeal in the Supreme Court (SC), seeking a stay on a High Court (HC) verdict that declared the 16th Amendment to the Constitution illegal and unconstitutional. The amendment has empowered Parliament to remove judges for misconduct or incapacity. Attorney general Mahbubey Alam submitted the petition to the SC yesterday afternoon. The chamber judge of the Appellate Division is likely to hold a hearing today (Monday), Alam said. On Saturday, the chief law officer of the state said the Constitution was supreme and that the HC could not declare any original provision of the Constitution as illegal. The 16th Amendment has merely restored an original provision of the Constitution formulated in 1972, he added. On Thursday, the HC had scrapped the 16th Amendment, observing that the process of investing Parliament with the authority to remove SC judges was an accident. A three-member special bench, headed by Justice Moyeenul Islam Chowdhury, declared the amendment as illegal and unconstitutional by majority opinion. The other two judges of the bench were Justice Quazi Reza-Ul Hoque and Justice Md Ashraful Kamal.
While the law minister criticised the HC verdict in Parliament, two MPs of the Jatiya Party and one from the Jatiya Samajtantrik Dal openly lambasted the HC. They felt that the HC verdict was a kind of conspiracy against democracy. On September 17, 2014, Parliament had unanimously passed the Constitution (16th Amendment) Bill, 2014, empowering it to remove SC judges for incapacity and misconduct, without any opposition and rejecting public opinion. President Md Abdul Hamid had given his consent to the bill on September 22. On April 25 this year, the Cabinet approved in principle the draft of the Bangladesh Supreme Court Judges (Investigation) Act 2016, which empowered the Jatiya Sangsad to impeach a judge of the highest court if allegations of misconduct or incapacity were proved against him/her. On November 9, 2014, in response to a petition, the HC had sought an explanation on why the 16th Amendment should not be considered illegal and unconstitutional. After the hearing, the HC declared the 16th amendment illegal.
