A petition seeking direction to the government to stay the Senate elections, scheduled to be held on March 2, until the forthcoming general election of the National and provincial assemblies were held, was filed with the Supreme Court on Wednesday.
The petition was filed by Dr Abid Rauf Aurakzai, chief executive of the School of Islam and Modern Science in Islamabad, through Advocate Tariq Asad under Article 184 (3) of the constitution, making the federation through the law secretary, the Election Commission of Pakistan through the chief election commissioner and the principal secretary to the prime minister respondents.
The petitioner contended that the circumstances did not allow for the Senate elections, therefore the elections should be stayed. The petitioner stated that the prevailing schedule of elections for the National Assembly for a period of five years and that of the Senate for a period of half the members for six years created hypothetical political conditions in the mandate of ruling party as experience shows that by fair elections the ruling party never wins the elections in the next tenure, but it remains in majority in the Senate by virtue of their mandate in the National and provincial assemblies.
This, he said always created political instability which caused ultimately the economic instability, thus the federal government be directed to amend the constitution so that the tenure of National Assembly as well as the Senate may be equal to preferably four years.
He said the government was stagnant and had failed in all fields and it was not practically functioning in any department. He said the main problems included political instability, corruption, economic crisis, identity crisis, legitimacy crisis, leadership crisis, decay of partnership among the federation and units, corruption in anti-corruption agencies, insecurity, anti-state foreign policy, conspiracies against the army and its units, confrontation among the institutions, lack of transparency in public budgets and revenues, demand for separation or secession from the federation, mishandling of issue of war on terrorism, foreign attacks on its territory and external intervention in the sovereignty of state.
