and eventually forced President Rafiq Tarar to resign in order for Musharraf to assume the presidency. In light of the Supreme Court's verdict, the national referendum was held on 30 April 2002, allowing himself to continue his rule, but was alleged by many (including the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan) to be fraudulent. In 2002, the general elections restored democracy when the Musharraf-backed PML(Q), the libertarians, were able to form a minority government who would later nominate Musharraf for the 2004 presidential elections. In 2007, President Musharraf eventually imposed another martial law by having suspended the populist Chief Justice IM Chaudhry, leveling charges of corruption and misconduct. Unlike the earlier martial law, Musharraf was widely disapproved, inviting mass demonstrations led by Nawaz Sharif, Musharraf eventually resigned in an attempt to avoid impeachment in the Parliament. Sharif was acquitted in 2009 from the 1999 hijacking case and in 2014 acquitted of the money laundering and corruption cases from an accountability court. Events leading towards the martial law Relief of General Jehangir and Kargil debacle In 1997, Nawaz Sharif and his conservative Pakistan Muslim League-N won a landslide victory in the general elections, resulting in a two-thirds majority in the National Assembly– the lower house of bicameral Parliament of Pakistan. His second tenure was marked with a serious legal confrontation with the Supreme Court courted by Chief Justice Sajjad Ali Shah over the legality and technicality of Thirteenth Amendment and the Ehtesab Act, 1997 (lit. Accountability Act, 1997). Chief Justice Shah had been battling in the Supreme Court for his legitimacy due to many senior justices had seen his appointment as "inappropriate and political", having been appointed by former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in 1994. On 29 October 1997, Chief Justice Shah and his bench decided to hear the petition filed by the Pakistan Peoples Party's lawyers and suspended the implementation of bills. Prime Minister Sharif reacted angrily to the Court's actions, by issuing an intemperate public diatribe particularly against Chief Justice Shah. On 2 November 1997, Chief Justice Shah summoned Prime Minister Sharif for contempt of court but this order was viewed "null and voided" when two senior justices at the Supreme Court issued a counter-order. On 30 November 1997, Prime Minister Sharif appeared before the Supreme Court but his partisans stormed the Supreme Court Building forcing Chief Justice Shah to remove the finding of contempt against Sharif. While the police