ISLAMABAD, May 10: The government came under pressure in the National Assembly on Thursday over what it admitted was a grave law and order problem in Karachi, with the opposition accusing it of reprisals in the prevailing judicial crisis and a minister warning against a “third party” benefiting from the situation.

But the final government position remained unclear over opposition demands in a debate that the ruling coalition member Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) call off a planned May 12

rally in Karachi as a counter to a public reception arranged for Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, after ex-prime minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali voiced a strong dissent within the ruling party.

The government-offered debate on the law and order situation in the country’s commercial capital following a pre-dawn gunfire at the home of Justice Chaudhry’s counsel and Supreme Court Bar Association President Munir A. Malik will resume on Friday when the house will meet again at 10am.

Mr Jamali was greeted with cheers from opposition benches and a silence of apparent surprise from the treasury benches after he questioned the government’s right to hold rallies in support of its own reference charge-sheeting the chief justice, called for providing a “safe passage” to Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry in Karachi and appealed to both sides with folded hands to step back from a confrontation that he said could lead to civil war.

Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Khan Niazi offered the debate after members of the People’s Party Parliamentarians and the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) staged a token walkout to protest against the Karachi incident when the issue was raised by Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal deputy parliamentary leader Liaquat Baloch who accused the ruling party of pushing the situation to a catastrophe.

The minister acknowledged that the situation was grave and asked both sides of the political divide to avoid blaming each other and letting “any third party take benefit”, and later himself moved a motion for holding the debate by putting aside the agenda set for the day immediately after the question-hour.

Minister of State for Interior Zafar Iqbal Warraich, briefly intervening in the debate after some opposition members accused the MQM for creating the present and previous law and order problems since mid-1980s, told the house that Mr Malik had filed a first information report to police against unknown people about the attack on his house, which he said was carried out with Kalashnikov fire by “some people” who came there at 3.30am on Thursday, leaving 16 bullet marks.

He said the government was in touch with the Sindh government and that every effort would be made to trace the attackers.

“Are we heading towards a civil war,” Mr Jamali, a member of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League (PML), asked and said a confrontation in the situation could terminate the remaining life of the present parliament. “A slight slip can doom you and a slight slip can make things going.”

He said since the chief justice was not inviting people to any rally, nobody should object to public response in his support and added: “It is a strange thing that the government recommends a reference (against the chief justice) and then holds a rally to support it.”

In an apparent objection to the alleged role of the Punjab provincial government in the planned Islamabad rally on May 12 to be addressed by President Pervez Musharraf, Mr Jamali wondered whether the bigger province should encourage counter rallies in smaller provinces where other parties had their strongholds.

In what appeared to be a call for putting off the MQM rally in Karachi, he said if there was a threat to law and order, the government “must make the sacrifice” and give “a safe passage” to Justice Chaudhry. “If he being the chief justice has to face this situation, then what can happen to a common citizen?”

“The city of Karachi is burning,” MMA member Mohammad Hussain Mehanti said, accusing the MQM for the attack on Mr Malik’s house and voicing fears that the MQM rally plan could lead to a “big clash” there, as did his alliance colleague Farid Ahmad Piracha.

MQM members Haider Abbas Rizvi and Israrul Ebad denied the charge, condemned the firing incident and questioned the justification of blaming MQM workers while Mr Malik had filed a report against unknown people.

PPP members from Sindh Sher Mohammad Baloch and Manzur Hussain Wassan urged the MQM to change its rally plan and support the people rather than a general.

PML-N member Tehmina Daultana accused the government of planning to spend Rs500 million for the Islamabad and Karachi rallies and said President Musharraf should know that his “time is over”.

PML member from Punjab Farooq Amjad Mir said his party and the MQM were organising rallies only to counter opposition moves to influence the judiciary in the cases relating to the reference filed against the chief justice and added that the two sides could make an arrangement to avoid a clash in Karachi.