'No to SPLGO': Threats, insults dominate Sindh Assembly session

Opposition refers to SPLGO as a “blind law” and “treason”.

KARACHI:
There was pandemonium in the Sindh Assembly session on Thursday after protests from the opposition against the Sindh Peoples Local Government Ordinance 2012 turned into personal attacks being pitched back and forth between the assembly members.

As the opposition protested, senior Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) leader Pir Mazharul Haq told Nusrat Sehar Abbasi of the opposition to “shut up”, a move which resulted in uproar and attacks of “you shut up” and slogans of “shame, shame” for addressing a woman as such.

One female member of the assembly was heard saying that this was an assembly and not “someone’s aunt’s house”.

Opposition shouted slogans of “division of Sindh is unacceptable” and the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) members shouting “Jeay Bhutto, Jeay Sindh”.

After long drawn out bashing from both sides, the assembly chaos subsided enough for the Speaker to resume the session.

Both sides continued to threaten each other, now one at a time.


Jam Madad Ali - leader of the opposition in the Sindh Assembly - said that they retained the right to protest against, what he referred to as, a “blind law” and “treason”.

The ruling party and those supporting the SPLGO were called traitors by someone, after which Agha Siraj Durrani said that no one had the right to call them that.

Durrani, referring to when someone had picked up his copy of the SPLGO and torn it, said: “We did not tear anyone’s things; if we do, they will remember it forever.”

He criticised the opposition for its strikes and agitated behavior, adding that if strikes and agitation affected the outcome of anything, Kashmir would have been freed a long time ago.

The assembly session was in chaos from the start, with members belonging to Pakistan Muslim League – Functional (PML-F), Awami National Party and National Peoples Party staging protests and a walk out for not being given opposition seats.

After they protested with black bands on their arms, the Speaker allotted them opposition seats.

A team of journalists from a private TV channel had also walked out earlier due to mistreatment from police.
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