Shehbaz hopes Parliament will vote against PECA

PML-N President and Leader of the Opposition Shehbaz Sharif expressed hope on Saturday that government members in Parliament will vote against the PECA ordinance, which has made online ‘defamation’ of authorities a criminal offence with harsh penalties.

Congratulating the newly elected officials of the Association of Electronic Media Editors and News Directors (AMEAND), Shehbaz said that they had taken office at a time when journalism and freedom of expression were under attack in the country.

He claimed that blood was being shed through the use of black laws despite the freedoms given in the Constitution of the country.

The opposition leader maintained that he stood with media personnel in their struggle for the protection and promotion of journalism, freedom of expression and civil liberties.

“Journalism and politics have always been together in the survival, promotion and protection of the democratic system,” he said, adding that without both journalism and politics, one's freedom could not survive.

Read AEMEND rejects PECA tweak

The PML-N leader reiterated that he had rejected the “black” PECA ordinance and had submitted a resolution to the parliament to repeal it.

“We hope that coalition partners and members of the government will vote in favour of the resolution to repeal the PECA ordinance,” he said.

Earlier this week, major opposition parties, the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) and the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), moved resolutions in the National Assembly seeking to get the controversial Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act (PECA) Ordinance 2022 thrown out.

The resolutions were submitted to the office of the National Assembly speaker under Rule 170(2) of the Rules of Procedure and Conduct of Business in the National Assembly 2007 by PPP’s Agha Rafiullah and PML-N’s Marriyum Aurangzeb.