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ISLAMABAD: In what seemed as at least a temporary truce between them, the ruling coalition and the opposition joined voices in the National Assembly on Thursday in demanding that the government consider withdrawing the latest increase in domestic oil prices after Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani promised to do “whatever is possible”.
The demand came in a joint resolution unanimously passed by the house after opposition leader Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan had cited it as one of opposition’s conditions for supporting a government bill seeking an amendment to the Constitution to validate over 20 post-Eighteenth Amendment by-elections.
Before PML-N lawmaker Ahsan Iqbal moved what he called a “consensus draft”, the prime minister said he had discussed the matter with Finance Minister Abdul Hafeez Sheikh after arriving in the house during the opposition leader’s speech and, after suggesting formation of a bipartisan parliamentary committee to make recommendations, added: “Whatever is possible, we will definitely do.”
The brief resolution, which had been in the making since the opening day of the session on Wednesday amid an apparent outcry across party lines at up to six per cent hike in the prices of petroleum products effective from that day, said the government “should consider withdrawal” of the increase “in the interest of the people of Pakistan” and demanded that a house committee make recommendations on the issue within a week.
Petroleum and Natural Resources Minister Dr Asim Hussain, while responding to a call-attention notice earlier from five members of the MQM, also said the government would have no objection to the formation of a new house committee to help regulate petroleum prices or reactivate the one that one lawmaker said had been set up much earlier but was given up after price-fixing was given entirely to the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority.
Chaudhry Nisar’s other conditions for PML-N’s support for the Constitution (Twentieth Amendment) bill included categorical assurances about the independence of the next chief election commissioner, to be appointed after the incumbent retires, and of an interim government to be set up to oversee the next general elections.
The prime minister said he had asked the chief whip of the ruling Pakistan People’s Party in the lower house, Khursheed Ahmed Shah, and Senator Raza Rabbani, the former chairman of the parliamentary committee on constitutional reforms that had drafted the landmark Eighteenth Amendment, to discuss with the opposition if the existing mechanism could be further improved and added: “If the opposition has any suggestions, we will support them.”
But Mr Gilani was not so responsive to the opposition leader’s outrage at alleged custodial deaths of four young men out of 11 detained by intelligence agencies in connection with various attacks on military establishments and personnel, saying that since the matter was before the Supreme Court “we should wait for the outcome and refrain from constituting a committee” (to seek answers from heads of intelligence agencies).
Chaudhry Nisar devoted a considerable portion of his speech to these deaths, urging the prime minister to take a “serious notice” of the issue to rein in the intelligence agencies and also asking the Chief of the Army Staff General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani to “protect the honour and prestige” of the army by acting against such abuses.
He said the heads of intelligence agencies should be called to answer to parliament about those deaths, and also suggested a “court of inquiry” in which parliament members are a party.
The brief constitution amendment bill seeks to give legal cover to by-elections to a total of 23 seats of both houses of parliament and provincial assemblies held during the period when the Election Commission was not complete with the appointment of four of its members as required by the Eighteenth Amendment, was put on the house agenda for the second day but was put off again in search of a unanimous vote, as had happened with the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Amendments.
The government says it has two-thirds majorities in both the 342-seat National Assembly and the 100-seat Senate required for the passage of an amendment to the Constitution.
But when acting speaker Faisal Karim Kundi asked if the government was ready for taking up the bill, Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Moula Bakhsh Chandio asked for ”a little postponement” for “consultation going on with friends”.
Despite the prime minister’s apparently positive response over oil prices and possible improvement in the future electoral arrangements, there was no immediate word from the PML-N, the largest opposition party in the house, if it would vote for the bill when it comes up again on Friday, when the house is due to meet at 10am.
