Divided houses: Fierce debate rages in parliament on Rangers powers

Khursheed Shah hits out at Chaudhry Nisar as PTI, MQM, AML rail against PPP

ISLAMABAD:

The Rangers operation in Karachi dominated debate in both houses of parliament on Monday, after Leader of the Opposition in the National Assembly Khursheed Shah and Senator Saeed Ghani raised the issue in the National Assembly and the Senate, respectively.

While the Awami National Party backed the Pakistan Peoples Party’s stance in both houses, Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, Muttahida Qaumi Movement and Shaikh Rasheed railed against the PPP.

Since no one from the treasury benches defended Nisar in parliament in his absence, the minister was prompted into issuing a media statement later.

Shah’s speech was a mixture of threats, complaints, allegations, suggestions, requests and some signs of reconciliation. It focused on Nisar’s allegation that the Sindh government was not extending the duration of Rangers’ special powers to save only one person – former president Asif Ali Zardari’s close associate Dr Asim Hussain.



“Our fight is not to save one person, as there is a system of judiciary in the country to see such cases,” Shah said. “There is a specific job for everyone. Doctors work in hospitals, teachers focus on teaching, the army’s primary responsibility is to defend the country’s borders and the judiciary is supposed to deliver justice.”

“Nisar himself admits that the Rangers aren’t meant for anti-corruption efforts, but gets angry whenever we [PPP] say the same,” Senator Ghani, meanwhile, said in the upper house.

Shah warned the federal government against imposing governor’s rule in Sindh and acting against the provincial assembly’s decision, saying the ‘fight could be prolonged’. He said the Rangers issue “would have been resolved in a day or two but someone is unnecessarily playing with this legal matter.”

The opposition leader added that Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had assured Sindh Chief Minister Qaim Ali Shah that he would resolve the controversy after returning from China.

“We are waiting for the prime minister’s return. He would never allow jolting any one unit of the federation. Sindh is a pillar of the federation and any damage to it can be dangerous for the country.”

Shah did praise the Rangers operation in Karachi, crediting the paramilitary force with the improvement in law and order in the province. “We highly appreciate Rangers’ sacrifices,” he said.

He did not elaborate on what exactly the point of contention was over which the Sindh government was not ready to extend the special powers of the Rangers.

On the other hand, he complained that the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) was conducting ‘specific’ rather than across the board accountability.

“NAB, unfortunately, sees corruption in Sanghar only,” he said. “It was unable to trace any corruption in the mega-scams I referred to it as head of the Public Accounts Committee.”

Shah suggested that the PPP was being targeted by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government for not extending cooperation when the PTI was staging its sit-in last year.

He said that when the PPP was in power, there were allegations that some Punjab ministers had ties with militants and demands were raised about an operation in the province. “But we never said enough is enough.”

Nisar did not spare the opposition leader in his statement to the media. He called Shah an “opposition leader who belongs in the era of General Ayub Khan, whose task is to play friendly opposition while taking benefits from the government.”

He claimed that the PPP government was so corrupt “that it did not spare Hajj and Umra programmes.”

“It is unfortunate that few people took shelter of Sindh and Pakistan for their dirty politics,” he said. Nisar pointed out that the Rangers operation in Karachi is not a purely provincial subject as the paramilitary force works under the interior ministry.


Published in The Express Tribune, December 15^th, 2015.