By Staff Reporter
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan Peoples Party chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari urged National Assembly opposition leader Mahmood Khan Achakzai on Thursday to use the authority delegated to him by jailed Imran Khan to direct opposition members back into parliamentary committees.
Speaking in the lower house during a sitting chaired by Deputy Speaker Syed Ghulam Mustafa, Bhutto-Zardari said the opposition’s boycott of committee work had weakened parliament. He asked Achakzai to nominate a representative to the new parliamentary committee on electoral reforms and send the name to the speaker’s office.
Achakzai, replying in the House, said parliament should be made the source of power and that parties working to strengthen it would receive support. He also repeated his demand for a committee to examine alleged government corruption. Urging reconciliation, he said no new political forces would emerge and that existing ones had to move past old disputes. “Neither are you so good, nor are we so bad. Let us sit together,” he said.
Bhutto-Zardari told the House that the government and the speaker had duties to fulfil, but that the opposition also had to play its part. “If Parliament is powerful, we are all powerful; this is the power bestowed on us by the people of Pakistan,” he said.
Pointing to the opposition benches, he said: “Those who want this House to remain dysfunctional and do not want the people of Pakistan to benefit from it have succeeded.” He added, sarcastically: “Congratulations to you.”
“You have played a part in helping these people achieve their objective,” he said.
He said opposition members had a duty to represent their parties, voters and constituencies in committees, but were not raising those concerns on the relevant platforms. PTI lawmakers quit the chairmanships of several National Assembly standing committees in August last year, following the party leadership’s directive.
The PPP chairman said the electoral reforms committee was the place to start. The opposition has described electoral rigging as its “fundamental issue”, and he said that if it wanted the matter addressed before the next general election, local government polls or by-elections, PTI members would have to join the panel.
He called participation a first step towards restoring “the strength and respect that Parliament deserved”.
“I request the opposition to at least exercise the power it has,” he said. “If we make efforts to bring all stakeholders together in a committee or arrange a briefing on terrorism, economic and security issues, and other concerns without the opposition’s participation, it will be pointless.”
The National Assembly passed a motion earlier this month to form the committee. It will draw members from both houses on the basis of proportional representation.
Bhutto-Zardari also asked the foreign, interior, defence and finance ministers to brief the House on the regional situation, citing the war in Iran and disruption to shipping in the Strait of Hormuz and the Red Sea. He sought a separate briefing on the defence agreements Pakistan has recently signed.
“Tell this House about the potential threats facing Pakistan and the region, particularly as three key maritime routes are closed,” he said.
“Every member of this House has the right to be informed about the challenges facing Pakistan, whether terrorism or other domestic issues, the steps being taken to address them and their potential consequences in the days ahead,” he said.
Separately on Thursday, a PPP delegation of former prime minister Raja Pervez Ashraf and former federal minister Syed Naveed Qamar met Achakzai to invite PTI to join the committee. The meeting took place at the office of Senate opposition leader Raja Nasir Abbas, who was present along with PTI senators.
Ashraf told a press conference afterwards that the delegation had acted on Mr Bhutto-Zardari’s instructions. “The PPP wants the PTI to participate in parliamentary standing committees as well as the electoral reforms committee,” he said. He said Mr Achakzai welcomed the message, but had asked for time to consult before giving a formal answer. “The PTI will respond to the PPP after consultations,” Ashraf said.
The approach comes with relations between the government and opposition close to breakdown. Talks failed before the federal government imposed governor’s rule and an emergency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa on 11 October, citing the PTI-led provincial government’s “deliberate disengagement” from the fight against terrorism. The opposition criticised the move.
At a rally in Karachi earlier this month, Bhutto-Zardari said that constructive engagement by the opposition with the federal government could lead to governor’s rule in the province being reversed.
On 23 October, the opposition said Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif should personally invite it to talks if the government was serious about negotiations, adding that it could not trust those who mocked the dialogue process. A day earlier, Achakzai and PTI chairman Barrister Gohar Ali Khan had criticised the government over the stalled negotiations and restrictions on parliamentarians.
Bhutto-Zardari made a similar appeal on 20 August, urging the opposition to rejoin the standing committees. He also sought its cooperation on appointing the chief election commissioner and members of the Election Commission of Pakistan, as well as on electoral reforms.
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