ISLAMABAD:
The 18th Amendment to the Constitution was approved and passed by the National Assembly on the 8th of April, 2010 during the reign of the PPP. It proves to be a landmark amendment for Pakistan as it completely changed the country’s political spectrum by removing the president’s power to dissolve parliament and sack the Prime Minister, hence turning Pakistan from a semi-presidential to a parliamentary republic. The amendment intended to remove the changes made to the Constitution in the dictatorial regimes of President Zia and Musharraf, thereby returning many democratic elements back to the country.
What was surprising, however, was the fact that it was the first time a sitting president decreased his own powers and transferred them to the Prime Minister and parliament. Furthermore, the most famous and major change that this amendment made was the devolution of many ministries to the provinces in order to increase provincial autonomy. This meant that provincial governments were now in control of many important affairs such as education, health, environment, archaeology and collection of zakat.
While this amendment is hailed as a great democratic achievement by many, it has its fair share of critics. There are some that say that this amendment needs a provision to further devolve powers to districts and sub-districts in cities so that developmental work can take place unhinged. Many also call for the amendment to be abolished. They claim that this amendment has fostered disunity in the country as every province does what it pleases and has, for instance, its own educational curriculum. Furthermore, detractors believe that the amendment has especially ruined Sindh, since the ruling PPP has not done any developmental work in the province.
There have been rumors that the ruling PTI wants to revoke the amendment, but this can only be done with support from the other parties as it requires a three quarters majority in parliament. Since the PPP and the PML-N think this amendment to be sacred, it is highly unlikely that this amendment will go anywhere in the near future.
Ishtiaq Mirza
Islamabad
Published in The Express Tribune, September 1st, 2020.
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