Another ‘democratic’ game has come to an end: Sardar Ayaz Sadiq has been elected again to the position of Speaker of the House after he had been deseated by an election tribunal in August, which accepted PTI Chairman Imran Khan’s petition challenging Ayaz Sadiq’s 2013 election win on charges of manipulation. PML-N made it a matter of honour to bring him back into the Parliament and the Speaker’s seat thus to prove the accusations of PTI wrong. Sadiq though reclaimed his seat with a very thin margin from his last win against PTI’s Aleem Khan in the NA-122 by-polls.
Sardar Ayaz was voted into the old position with more votes than last time, as this time MQM and the religious parties as well as the FATA members all voted for him. That must have cost some promise for the PML-N, like an announcement for another round of meetings of the FATA reforms committee which was announced shortly before the vote casting. MQM is in a precarious situation and so far we don’t know what price for their vote was. But as a matter of fact, a sitting government can buy as many votes as it needs with the Opposition being weak and divided. All waiting for good gesture from the rulers.
The idea of people’s representation even after so many years is alien to Pakistan and our ‘electables’; it is a matter of give and take only and NRO and Charter of Democracy are nothing but a curse for the nation.
ALI ASHRAF KHAN
Camp at Reading, UK
