- Dr Mazari demands to brief over Foreign Ministry’s strategy to deal with new American policy
- PTI lawmaker says Arab monarchs trying to divide Muslims, showing “extraordinary” loyalty
The united opposition in the National Assembly was apparently denied an opportunity for a second consecutive day on Thursday to move a resolution to denounce US President Donald Trump’s executive order to bar citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States for the next 90 days and suspends the admission of all refugees for 120 days.
Deputy Speaker Murtaza Javed Abbasi asked the opposition to follow the rules but the lawmakers kept demanding for the permission to move their resolution. Speaking on a point of order, Dr Shireen Mazari – mover of the resolution – said that as the entire western countries were condemning Trump’s move, it was surprising to note that Pakistan, as a leader of the Muslim world, was keeping mum over the racist decision by the US administration.
When the deputy speaker asked her to bring in a unanimous resolution with the government, Dr Mazari said that she had already shared opposition’s resolution with Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Sheikh Aftab Ahmed on Wednesday but he (the minister) was absent from the House in an apparent bid to dodge it. She said that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs needed to brief the august House over its strategy to deal with the issue.
“Today it’s about other seven countries but Pakistan too can become its victim,” she said and added that if Pakistan was silent, no one would support it in future. She also wondered over the support accorded to Trump’s ban against seven Muslim countries by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, saying the Arab monarchs had gone too far in proving their loyalty to the US and hence had left the Muslims divided.
Dr Nafisa Shah of the Pakistan People’s Party also put her party’s weight behind the PTI lawmaker and demanded that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs must take the House into confidence over the country’s stance about this development on Friday (today). Speaking on a point of order, she said that even a large number of American citizens were already on roads, holding protests over the Muslim ban.
She also raised her voice for the sudden disappearance and recovery of five bloggers, saying that once they disappeared under ‘mysterious’ circumstances, some people levelled allegations of blasphemy against them. “If they were involved in blasphemous activity, why action was not tried under the much-hyped Cyber Crimes Bill,” she said and asked Minister for Interior Affairs Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan to respond to the question.
However, Mehmood Bashir Virk from the Pakistan Muslim League-N opposed the idea to support the bloggers, saying that the recovered bloggers must tell their story rather than pointing fingers at the state institutions. “They (bloggers) must tell who was involved in their disappearances and how they were recovered,” he questioned. “It looks to be a planned affair,” he said.
He said that they (bloggers) should be asked about their disappearance. “We can’t allow anyone to get involved in the blasphemous act in the name of freedom of speech,” he remarked. Sahibzada Tariqullah of the Jamaat-e-Islami asked the government to share the reasons for taking Jamaat-ud-Da’wah leader Hafiz Muhammad Saeed into custody.
-Bills passed-
The House passed two bills moved by the government. The Cost and Management Accountants (Amendments) Bill 2016 – moved by Minister for Law and Justice Zahid Hamid – was passed with a majority. The minister also moved another bill further to amend the code of civil procedure, 1908 and the code of criminal procedure, 1898 (The Costs of Litigation Bill 2016). The House passed the bill unanimously while the opposition appreciated the spirit of the bill which aimed at speedy justice.
Zahid Hamid told the House that the bill was aimed at providing speedy justice and to avoid sumptuous justice for the common citizens of the federal capital. He said that the bill was aimed at discouraging the delaying tactics and procedures and to support the citizens with low-cost justice at their doorsteps. He said if this experience was successful in the capital city, this law may be replicated by the provincial governments too to facilitate the people at large.
Another bill aimed at converting State Life Insurance Corporation into a limited company was referred to the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Commerce for deliberations. The house deferred four bills to discuss them on Friday (today).
