The ruling Pakistan People’s Party and its allies in the Lower House of parliament might forget what the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz members shouted on Monday but they will never forget how the members of the major opposition party made them feel when they protested in the House against persons they refused to acknowledge as members of the cabinet.
The PML-N members declared Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and Minister for Petroleum Dr Asim Hussain “strangers” in the Senate and National Assembly, respectively.
As soon as the minister for petroleum tried to respond to a supplementary question during the Question Hour, the PML-N members refused to recognise him as member of the cabinet.
“He is a stranger… he is no more a minister as there is no prime minister and federal cabinet in the country,” the PML-N members, wearing black armbands shouted. Members of the PPP and its coalition partners kept sitting as silent spectators.
An inte resting situation developed during the Question Hour when each PML-N member, turn-by-turn asked the same question about the government’s implementation of the Supreme Court orders instead of a supplementary question, forcing the deputy speaker to immediately calling “next question”.
NA Speaker Fehmida Mirza and Leader of Opposition in the National Assembly Nisar Ali Khan did not attend the session. As the PML-N members continued creating rumpus in the House, Deputy Speaker Faisal Kundi who was chairing the session, vigorously pursued the “Orders of the Day” and finished with seven of the eight agenda items including tabling the ordinance “Drug Regulatory Agency of Pakistan Ordinance, 2012” before he adjourned the session for Wednesday.
Call it a policy of not directly confronting each other or letting the other party do its part on the SC’s decision, Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani chose the Upper House to vent his anger against the opposition party and the judiciary.
According to sources in parliament, Gilani had been informed in advance of the aggressive stance the PML-N was to adopt in view of which he consulted his coalition partners and avoided the National Assembly proceedings. However, as the prime minister ended his speech in the Senate, the PML-N’s Syed Zafar Ali Shah, on a point of order, called the PM “a stranger in the House” and the party members staged a walkout.
The sitting of the National Assembly lasted only 32 minutes as the House was adjourned amid sloganeering by the opposition.
The deputy speaker was forced to adjourn the sitting, which started an hour and 28 minutes behind schedule. A total of 115 legislators were present at the beginning and 170 when the sitting was adjourned, however, the press gallery was full of journalists.
Of the 19 questions to be taken up during the Question Hour, only one was put up and only one supplementary question was raised during the sitting. The Chartered Accountants (Amendment) Bill 2012 was introduced in the House and sent to the respective standing committee.