Sindh Assembly session: Opposition wants house count cancelled

Bill on travel agencies passed unanimously.

KARACHI:

The opposition in the Sindh government has demanded the house count be cancelled.

The debate flared up during the Sindh Assembly session on Friday.

After much debate, the treasury benches accepted these concerns and, instead of silencing the voice of opposition, agreed to take up the issue with the federal government. The adjournment motion was, however, adjourned till Monday.

Senior Education Minister Pir Mazharul Haq told the house that they conveyed their reservations to the centre.

“The federal government assured us that they will rectify the irregularities by counting those houses that were left out,” he said. He pointed out that some people have started agitating against the census but that will only worsen the problem. “Recently, a young body was killed in Dadu during a demonstration against the census. We should discourage this practice.”

In her adjournment motion, Pakistan Muslim League - Functional MPA Marvi Rashdi explained that due to the irregularities, the people of Sindh will turn into a minority.

The census is the major criterion according to which resources are distributed among provinces. She demanded a fresh count under the army’s supervision.

Rashdi supported her motion with news clippings to prove irregularities but Deputy Speaker Shahla Raza, who was chairing the session, rejected them.

“We should not believe news stories. The speakers of both national and Sindh assemblies have given a ruling that issues based only on news reports cannot be discussed on the floor of parliament or the assembly,” Raza said.

Rashdi pointed out that this was the third adjournment motion to be rejected by treasury members, at which Law Minister Ayaz Soomro assured her that the government is committed to rectifying all errors. He added, however, that the adjournment motion was not admissible and therefore could not be discussed.

Opposition leader Jam Madad Ali said that even though they had supported the government at every step, it was unfortunate that the treasury members were turning down every issue of public importance.

“The media plays a vital role in highlighting public issues and treasury members used to refer news reports in the past. I don’t know why reports on census irregularities are being treated with caution,” he said.

Meanwhile, Muttahida Qaumi Movement’s Sardar Ahmed referred to the Supreme Court ruling and said that a discussion based on news stories can be held but there is no need to take up this sensitive issue at the moment. “It seems like we have lost confidence in ourselves and that has compelled us to invite the armed forces to supervise the census. We consider it a wrong demand.”

In-camera session on target killings

The Sindh government assured opposition members that it can call an in-camera, or closed-door, session if they move a resolution on target killings. Soomro said that they will brief assembly members on the conspiracies being hatched against the government. Earlier, Rashdi raised the issue of target killings across the province. “If the federal government can call an in-camera session then why can’t we?” she asked.

Health department

Health Minister Dr Sagheer Ahmed said that there were only three mammography machines - two in Karachi and one in Hyderabad.

The total cost of each is between Rs30 million and Rs40 million. He assured that the health department will buy more machines in the next budget.

Responding to a question by Pakistan Peoples Party’s Nadeem Bhutto, he said that no seat has been reserved in any medical college or university on ethnic, religion or linguistic basis.

The number of seats in medical colleges has been increased by 10 per cent but the syndicate of Dow University has reduced its seats for rural Sindh from 63 to 30.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 14^th, 2011.