Questions and answers: PPP, PML-Q requisition Assembly session

Opposition wants to quiz govt on Faisalabad firing and flood precautions.

LAHORE:

The joint opposition in the Punjab Assembly consisting of the PPP and the PML-Q on Tuesday submitted a requisition to the Assembly secretariat seeking discussion on two issues: the celebratory firing at PML-N’s rally in Faisalabad, and the Punjab government’s preparations for the flood season.

Opposition Leader Raja Riaz told The Express Tribune that besides PPP’s 108 members, five members of PML-Q had also signed the requisition.

Riaz said that PML-N workers, during celebrations for party office nominations on Monday, brought out processions from parts of Faisalabad and participants not only carried weapons but also resorted to firing. He said that carrying weapons in demonstrations was banned, but PML-N workers had violated the laws.

Riaz said instead of arresting the workers the government had protected and encouraged them. He said that these workers have raised slogans against PPP workers and tried to provoke them. He said that if a clash had taken place then PPP would have registered an FIR against Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif.

Riaz went on to say that the Punjab government had failed to maintain law and order in the province and had lost the moral right to rule.

He said that the judicial inquiry’s reports on the flood in Punjab had held Sharif responsible for the devastation caused by the floods.

He said that opposition parties in PA also wanted to know what measures the government had taken to prevent similar devastations this year. He said that according to his information the provincial government had so far taken no steps the opposition would consider satisfactory. He said that opposition parties in the PA would force the provincial government to incorporate their suggestions in its strategy for flood control and flood relief. Under the law, once the opposition submits a requisition for a session the speaker is required to convene the session within fourteen days.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 13^th, 2011.