- Dangerous trends
The Senate is also called the House of Federation to reinforce the idea that the chamber symbolises the federation. Unlike the National Assembly where representation is based on population, the Senate has equal representation from all four federating units. Besides undertaking legislative activity the Senate also conducts the oversight and accountability of the Executive. In view of its mandate the upper house is supposed to have members with a federal rather than a strong centrist or parochial outlook. The Senators can be politicians, academicians, professionals or prominent members of the business community. What matters is that they possess the required intellectual stature, courage and a fair knowledge of how the system works. The Senate should not be a place for people who have nothing to contribute during the debates and are there simply to vote obediently in line with the party policy. It goes to the credit of the Senate that its members have on several occasions in the past given preference to loyalty to the federation over loyalty to their party. What is more while holding accountable they never treated any institution as a holy cow.
The Senate working has suffered in the past whenever two categories of individuals managed to get inducted into it. First, the moneybags who got party tickets on the basis of their fabulous wealth or won as independent candidates through horse trading and then joined the ruling party. The second category comprised those who lacked the required intellect but were given party tickets for no other reason than blind loyalty to the party boss. This category simply toed the party line, making little contribution to the Senate debates.
Unfortunately both categories are working hectically this time to enter the Senate in bulk. For 52 vacant seats there are more than 140 candidates. Wary of the recent parliamentary coup in Balochistan PM Abbasi has promised to name and shame those indulging in horse trading in the Senate elections. Abbasi has however conveniently forgotten to mention the lot some of the mainstream parties including PML-N have nominated for Senate which is not known for anything other than sycophancy or wealth.