Legal Chaos

In Karachi last week, when a butcher was accused of bringing cattle into the city without a permit, his lawyer asked the court: "Is there, legally speaking, such a place as Karachi?" The government, red-faced, asked a postponement. A navy lieutenant, charged with drunkenness, boldly asked his accusers"! "On whose authority is this court-martial held? Is there, legally speaking, a commander in chief?" The court-martial was promptly adjourned.

Pakistan, the world's seventh most populous nation, is in legal chaos. Governor General Ghulam Mohammed's right to collect taxes, arrest criminals and run the country is in serious question. A month ago Pakistan's Federal Court invalidated 46 of the country's basic laws on the grounds that between 1948 and 1954 the Constituent Assembly had not submitted its laws to the Governor General.

Decreeing "emergency powers" to himself, Ghulam Mohammed revalidated most of the laws, but last week the court ruled that his action was illegal: only an Assembly and a Governor General acting jointly comprise a sovereign body. This was a bit awkward for Ghulam, who dissolved the Assembly last year and now runs a "controlled democracy" of his own.

In teeming Karachi, swollen with a million refugees, energetic Pakistanis went about business as usual. Whatever legal confusion there might be to litigants, drovers with their camel carts and cabbies in their ancient Kaiser sedans still obeyed Karachi's traffic cops. Ghulam called a new "constituent convention" of 60 mem bers--seven members appointed by himself and 53 to be elected by provincial assemblies--to cooperate with him in rule by law. Until the convention assembles in May, Ghulam will do his best to contain legal chaos by seeking "the Federal Court's advice."

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