ISLAMABAD: The Charter of Pakistan (CoP) proposed by Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Patronn Nawaz Sharif seems not to have worked as all major political parties including the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP)-led coalition have rubbished it for not being practical.
The PPP leadership is unwilling to even take up the proposed CoP in its in-house discussion. Although Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani has said that the government would consider the proposal once shared with it, the presidency has simply laughed away the idea with President Asif Zardari telling his close aides that he was not in the mood to ‘redefine’ the existing working relationship between state institutions.
A source told Pakistan Today that the president just laughed when a reference was made to the CoP proposed by Nawaz Sharif. “Why to ignite an unnecessary controversy,” the source quoted the president as saying. “We have a Constitution which defines the role of every institution,” the president said.
Similarly, Fazlur Rehman also does not appear to have been fascinated with Nawaz Sharif’s idea of the CoP. “It is a frivolous proposal … why a charter for twenty-five years … politics is not our problem … our problem is economy and law and order, and they need to be resolved immediately,” Fazl told a group of journalists casually.
His argument is that national consensus on national issues is a pre-requisite to the solution of all problems, but taking advantage of others’ (the government’s) disadvantage works only in a situation that swings the pendulum in one’s favour.
“The resolve to support an evolving political system itself is a charter … once a system is evolved, all institutions and segments of society work within their precincts,” he said. The ANP also differs with the PML-N patron’s vision of the CoP as its president disagrees with the idea of involving the judiciary and Army in discussions to decide what shape the political system should take.
“It is for the politicians and civil society to formulate a national agenda … the judiciary and the Army have their roles already prescribed in the Constitution … if the civil society and the politicians agree to redefine the roles of the judiciary and the Army, the parliament is there to decide,” a source quoted him as saying.
The PML-Q leadership has similar views. “When we have a parliament in place, such proposals should be brought there … many ideas float outside parliament but they don’t work … let them first bring this proposal into parliament then we will consider it … the parliament is the best forum to evolve a national agenda,” PML-Q President Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain told Pakistan Today.
