Opposition outraged by ‘arm-twisting’ over constitutional tweaks
• PTI, JUI-F leaders allege lawmakers, their families facing intimidation from authorities, being offered exorbitant sums to vote in favour of amendment
• Qaiser questions need for high-handed actions when parliamentary panel is making progress towards consensus
• Tarrar accuses PTI of ‘kidnapping its own members’
ISLAMABAD: Members of opposition parties in both houses of parliament on Thursday decried the alleged harassment of their lawmakers, with the PTI claiming that its members were being offered up to Rs3 billion for their support to a government-proposed controversial amendment bill, aimed at bringing drastic changes to the country’s judicial system.
Speaking during sittings of the National Assembly and Senate, PTI lawmakers described incidents where they and their families faced intimidation from police and intelligence officials, ahead of the government’s plan to push through a constitutional amendment bill, currently under review by a special parliamentary committee.
Opening a formal debate on the “need for constitutional reforms”, moved by Syed Naveed Qamar of PPP, NA Opposition Leader Omar Ayub Khan alleged that several PTI members and their family members were being intimidated and implicated in fabricated cases to get their support for the bill.
“Put up signs of ‘democracy for sale’ or ‘loot sale’ outside [parliament],” he said, while quoting PTI MNA Junaid Akbar Khan, who claimed he had been offered Rs1bn for his vote. Mr Ayub alleged that members had been offered payment in any currency of their choosing.
Joining the debate, PTI’s Asad Qaiser claimed that members were being offered bribes ranging from Rs1bn to Rs3bn.
Mr Qaiser asked the government to end the “ongoing crackdown” against opposition members and release the seven “abducted” members of the PTI. He said the government was trying to enact the amendment on “gunpoint” at a time when the situation in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa was not good.
He asked that when a special committee was trying to develop a consensus on the draft amendment, why was the government pressurising lawmakers? Such actions, he said, were creating doubts in the minds of the people that there was some other “motive” behind the move.
“There should be no interference from the institutions and the environment should be made conducive,” he demanded.
Empty benches
Questioning the haste being showed by the government in its attempt to pass the constitutional amendment, Omar Ayub recalled that in 2010, they had spent months discussing the 18th Constitution Amendment bill before its eventual passage.
Claiming that the ruling coalition did not have the required numbers in parliament to get the amendment passed, Omar Ayub asked the government to either take responsibility for the steps being taken against opposition members, or expose those behind such acts of intimidation.
“Will the interior minister or the law minister confess that they are doing all this, or will they say it’s someone else?” he asked. Pointing towards the empty opposition benches, Mr Ayub asked, “Has anyone thought about why they are empty today?”
He then asked PPP’s Syed Khursheed Shah, who is heading the special committee on the amendment bill, to take notice of the alleged harassment of the PTI lawmakers, adding that he had also made this demand to Mr Shah during the committee meeting.
PTI ‘kidnapped own members’
Responding to the opposition’s points, Information Minister Attuallah Tarar claimed that the PTI had “kidnapped its members itself” and that they were being held in KP.
He accused the party of creating a “false narrative”, but at the same time declared that “no political party is bigger than Pakistan”.
Recalling the alleged victimisation of opposition members under the PTI regime, the minister asked the party not to take the government’s decency as its weakness.
PPP’s Ali Musa Gilani and Agha Rafiullah also called for investigations into allegations regarding offers being made to the lawmakers to seek their support for the proposed amendment bill, as well as the alleged victimisation of opposition lawmakers.
In a late-night development, today’s (Friday’s) sitting of the National Assembly — originally scheduled for 11am — was rescheduled to 6pm.
Senate
In Senate, Awami National Party (ANP) Chief Aimal Wali Khan was the first to raise the issue of alleged harassment of the lawmakers to coerce them to vote for the controversial constitutional package.
Speaking on a point of order, he regretted that a woman senator had been confined to her apartment in Parliament Lodges, which was besieged by police the night before.
“This is an insult to every lawmaker and the system”, he remarked and asked if this was the way to get votes.
The issue came up after BNP-M chief Sardar Akhtar Mengal revealed that two senators from his party, including a woman, were being ‘mistreated’ to secure their votes for the proposed constitutional amendment.
BNP-M’s Naseema Ehsan, who attended the Senate sitting, was so disturbed that she found it difficult to narrate details and just said: “The sanctity of chador and chaar diwari has been violated”.
PML-N Parliamentary Leader Irfan Siddiqui said the minister concerned should look into the matter and address the reservations, adding: “All this is shameful for all of us and for the house”.
MWM Senator Allama Raja Nasir Abbas pointed out that whereabouts of PTI Senator Saifullah Abro were not known for the past several weeks.
PPP parliamentary leader Sherry Rehman urged the government to protect the senators from any kind of harassment at the hands of security agencies.
PTI Parliamentary Leader Ali Zafar said it was the right of the parliamentarians that their family members should be protected from being strong-armed by the state.
He pointed out that only three or four senators of his party were in attendance because the others feared that they or their families could be abducted to get them to vote for the bill.
JUI-F’s Kamran Murtaza warned that his party would not vote for the bill, if such “coercive tactics” continued to be used against them.
Published in Dawn, October 18th, 2024