Deepening crisis: Dual national legislators to face court says ECP

Resignations of four MQM MNAs accepted; several resigning legislators take up new posts in Sindh govt.

ISLAMABAD:

Even as four Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) lawmakers resigned over the dual nationality row, more vacant seats are now in sight in the National Assembly. The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) secretary said on Sunday that those who have still not submitted affidavits regarding their nationality status will have to face the Supreme Court.

In their resignation letters to the National Assembly speaker, MQM MNAs Haider Abbas Rizvi, Syed Tayyab Hussain, Fauzia Ejaz and Nadeem Ahsan cited “personal reasons” for their decision to quit. The speaker notified the ECP after accepting their resignations effective from November 29 this year.

The seats vacated by the MQM legislators will remain vacant. “By-elections cannot be held on the vacant seats with less than 120 days to go before the incumbent parliament’s constitutional term expires,” ECP Secretary Ishtiaq Ahmed Khan told The Express Tribune.

The question that now arises is over the fate of 12 other legislators, in both the NA and provincial assemblies, who did not submit affidavits regarding their nationality by the November 30 deadline. “Their cases will be sent to the Supreme Court,” Khan said.

The ECP secretary emphasised that the court would judge as to whether these 12 members can continue to hold office. Whether they will ever get another shot at contesting elections is also in question.

“The court can declare that these members were not eligible to be elected as parliamentarians at it did in Interior Minister Rehman Malik’s case,” said former senator and law expert SM Zafar while talking to The Express Tribune. He added that the court can ask the resigned members to revoke the privileges they enjoyed as legislators for the last four and a half years.



In any case, all 16 members, including the MQM MNAs, will have to revoke any foreign nationality before contesting the next elections.

The ECP secretary said that in the future, all contesting candidates will have to declare their nationality at the time of filing their nomination papers. “We have included nationality clauses in the nomination papers for all future elections,” said Khan.

The ECP secretary added that all submitted replies will be scrutinised from Monday (today) onwards. He said a mechanism to verify the authenticity of the submitted replies existed. “The members were asked for attestations from concerned government officers from their areas or ECP offices, besides providing their identity cards,” Khan clarified.

From legislation to advising

While the outgoing legislators have left behind vacant seats, not all have quit politics just yet.  Rizvi, who was MQM’s deputy parliamentary leader in the National Assembly, has been appointed as an adviser to the Sindh chief minister, along with his party’s Sindh Assembly MPAs, Muhammad Raza Haroon and Muhammad Ali Shah. Haroon was formerly minister for information technology and Shah the sports minister.



Two Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) MPAs who resigned on Saturday also took oath, but as ministers once again rather than advisers. Both Murad Ali Shah and Sadiq Memon returned to their previous portfolios of Finance and Energy, and Sindh Technical Education and Vocational Training Authority, respectively. While the reasons for reinstating the MPAs as ministers was unclear, it appeared that the chief minister used his powers to reappoint them citing Article 130-A of the Constitution.

MQM’s Khawaja Izharul Hasan, who was previously an adviser to the chief minister, has also been appointed as minister but has not been assigned a portfolio yet. Rizvi is also yet to receive a portfolio.



Dual Nationality Bill

Several parties, including government allies, said they would not support the Dual Nationality Bill when it was tabled in the Senate for voting. Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid, Awami National Party and some senators from the ruling PPP opposed the government’s attempt to provide a legal cover to dual nationality holders.

The ANP walked out of the Senate when the bill was tabled, saying parliamentarians should not be dual nationality holders. The bill was referred to a parliamentary committee from where it was scheduled to hit the upper house for voting in the last Senate session, but it could not for lack of a majority.

(WITH ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY SAMEER MANDHRO IN KARACHI)

Published in The Express Tribune, December 3^rd, 2012.