National Assembly Opposition Leader and senior Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan said on Friday there was no threat to democracy and parliament, rather the government wanted to use the House for its own interests.
Speaking on a point of order in the National Assembly, he strongly objected to summoning a session in urgency and without taking the opposition parties into confidence, saying he was unable to understand what forced the government to summon a sitting and pass a resolution as there was no threat to parliament or democracy.
Nisar rejected the government’s intention to seek parliament’s confidence in the prime minister and the president at this juncture, questioning whether the opposition moved a no-confidence motion against the premier or had any of the allies quit the government, which prompted it to pass a resolution in the House in favour of the government. “I am unable to understand why the government wishes the parliament to express confidence in it at this particular juncture,” he added. “We have no confidence in the government and still it is expecting that we will repose confidence in it,” he said.
He also termed the draft resolution unwarranted and added that the government’s failures were the real threat to the system. He said the government never summoned a session to discuss inflation or load shedding, neither did it summon sessions after the Abbottabad incident and the NATO attack. “Let us know whom it is you fear so much… Why do you want to use this House for personal interests?” he added.
He said the Supreme Court decision in the National Reconciliation Ordinance (NRO) case could not be discussed in the House. He said if the government had some administrative issues with the army, it was not worthy of being discussed in the House either.
Nisar made it clear that the opposition would not let the government use the House to advance its personal agenda as the opposition also had options to block it. The PML-N leader said it was for the first time in the history of the country that no one from the opposition was supporting any undemocratic or unconstitutional change.
Nisar also came down hard on one of the federal cabinet members, saying he tried to malign the PML-N leadership. Without naming the PPP minister, Nisar warned that if he continued with his maligning campaign, the other side will also come up with some “stories and documents”.
Replying to Nisar, Religious Affairs Minister Syed Khurshid Shah said the session was summoned to debate what was being discussed outside parliament. He sought the opposition’s support for the resolution as “it must be undisputed and unanimous”.
