Opposition warns of fiery PA session

KARACHI:

The Sindh Assembly session has been summoned on Thursday where the newly elected MPAs belonging to ruling Pakistan People's Party (PPP) will take oath so that they can take part in the Senate elections scheduled on March 3. The PPP's Jam Shabir won the PS 43 Sanghar seat while Yousaf Baloch emerged victorious in PS-88 Malir.

Soon after the assembly secretariat issued the schedule of the upcoming session, the joint opposition members rushed to Speaker Agha Siraj Durrani office and submitted a requisition to issue a production order for Leader of Opposition, Haleem Adil Shaikh who was arrested last week.

Pakistan Tehreek e Insaf (PTI) parliamentary leader Bilal Ghaffar, Khurrum Sher Zaman, Mutthida Qaumi Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) Mohammad Hussain and Kanwar Naveed Jameel, Grand Democratic Alliance (GDA) MPAs Barrister Hasnain Mirza and Nand Kumar Goklani held a meeting with Durrani in his chamber and requested him to bring Leader of the Opposition in forthcoming session.

Sources in PTI told The Express Tribune that it would be a fiery session where opposition parties especially PTI lawmakers would protest against the arrest of Haleem Adil Shaikh who according to them had been politically victimised. "The speaker should issue a production order, if he fails then we cannot let them run the session," Bilal Ghaffar of PTI said.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 24^th, 2021.