The lawmakers from the PTI and JI had walked out from of the NA session. PHOTO: FILE
The National Assembly on Saturday saw the Leader of the Opposition playing the role of a peacemaker and scrambling out of the hall in a bid to bring back angry MPs who staged a walkout from the session.
The lawmakers from the Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Jamaat-e-Islami parties had walked out from of the National Assembly (NA) session in protest over separate issues.
At least twice Leader of the Opposition in the lower house, Khursheed Shah, asked treasury bench members to go and bring PTI members back to the house. As his pleas fell on deaf ears, Shah took upon himself the task of luring the agitated members of PTI and JI.
Led by their deputy parliamentary leader Shah Mehmood Qureshi, the PTI legislators staged a token walkout from the assembly in protest over collection of increased general sales tax (GST) proposed in the budget 2013/14 before the approval of Finance Bill by the National Assembly (NA).
“PTI colleagues are out. It does not look good. Please go and bring them back in,” Shah, the former chief whip of Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), asked the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) legislators sitting on treasury benches.
Cutting short his speech on the budget at the call for prayers, Shah took MQM parliamentary leader Farooq Sattar with him and went to hold talks with the PTI members.
After the call for prayer was over, Speaker Ayaz Sadiq kept calling out Shah’s name asking him to continue with his speech. The Leader of the Opposition soon entered the house accompanied by the PTI members. He then reminded PML-N members of his party’s democratic tradition.
Earlier, Jamaat-e-Islami also staged a walkout against the withdrawal of a relief package for the people of Malakand division. Sahibzada Tariqullah of JI said his party opposed government’s withdrawing relief package for the people of Malakand. They too returned to the house later alongside the PTI members.
Combined walkout
In the Senate, opposition parties staged a combined walkout over terrorist attacks on girl students in Quetta on Saturday and Quaid-e-Azam’s residency in Ziarat.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 16th, 2013.
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