In a major development, the government on Thursday succeeded in breaking the impasse over the revival of military courts for two years.
The breakthrough came in a marathon consultative session between the government and opposition leaders. National Assembly Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq chaired the meeting.
The military courts were established in January 2015 for two years after the December 2014 attack on the Army Public School in Peshawar which left 150 people, mostly children, dead.
The main opposition Pakistan Peoples Party had opposed the courts. It, however, extended its conditional support to the revival of the courts and voluntarily withdrew five of the nine recommendations it had initially demanded to be included in the draft bill.
On March 10, the government had tabled two bills in the National Assembly – the 28th Amendment Act-2017 and the subsequent amendments to the Pakistan Army Act-1952.
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The PPP that has the largest number of seats in the Senate had expressed serious reservations over the drafts and put forward nine recommendations. The government and PPP’s teams held a series of meetings during the past one and a half week in an attempt to reach a consensus on the issue.
On Thursday, the government accepted four demands of the PPP, including accused to be produced within 24 hours before the concerned court; accused to be supplied with grounds of arrest within 24 hours; accused shall have right to engage a counsel of his choice; and provisions of the Qanoon-i-Shahadat 1984 (Law of Evidence) shall apply.
Political parties have already agreed to form a National Security Committee of parliament to oversee the working of the military courts and other important matters of national security.
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Incorporated for a period of two years, the term of military courts had expired on January 7. The government then moved to re-establish military courts for which it contacted all political parties that have representation in parliament.
On February 28, all parliamentary parties, except the PPP, had agreed to give an extension to the military courts for another two years.
The PPP had boycotted the huddle. It arranged a multi-party conference on March 4 to take other parties on board. However, the moot did not get any encouraging response, and two days later the party on its own announced nine recommendations.
“We have agreed to re-establish military courts for a period of two years, considering it is an issue of national importance," Speaker Sadiq told reporters after the talks.
He said that the Constitution would be amended to introduce the military courts.
The government would now submit the amended draft bills on Monday in the National Assembly for a debate. Once approved, the bills would be sent to the Senate for approval.
An amendment to the Constitutional requires a two-thirds majority – both in the National Assembly and the Senate – for passage.
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