ISLAMABAD, Dec 16: Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani had a sobering advice for his cabinet ministers in the National Assembly on Tuesday: Own responsibility now instead of blaming predecessors.

The unexpected counsel came as the prime minister intervened in a debate on the prevailing price spiral after Water and Power Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf blamed the previous government for power shortages and outages, provoking protests from some members of the formerly ruling Pakistan Muslim League-Q (PML-Q), who contested the minister’s statement that the military-led regime did not add a single megawatt of electricity in nearly nine years.

Mr Gilani said he would like to tell the ministers of his 8-1/2-month-old government that despite whatever happened in the past “we should own (responsibility for) the present situation” after the Feb 18 election, which brought his Pakistan People’s Party (PPP)-led coalition into power.

“Now it is our responsibility, and we should accept the challenge,” he said, adding: “A blame game will not solve the problem. We own the responsibility and Insha-Allah we will deliver.”

PML-Q parliamentary leader Faisal Saleh Hayat welcomed the prime minister’s statement as “a beacon for his cabinet” as he and another party colleague, Sheikh Waqas Akram, gave up their plans for rebuttals in response to the prime minister’s second conciliatory gesture in as many days.

The government won praise from opposition benches on Monday for starting a debate then in the house on the security situation created by last month’s terror attacks in Mumbai, which New Delhi blames on perceived Pakistani linkages, and agreeing to go ahead with the meetings of an opposition-led standing committee on education to probe alleged favours won by a daughter of Chief Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar to get admission in a medical college.

The debate on the Mumbai-related situation could not be resumed on Tuesday as it was a private members’ day and will be taken up on Wednesday, when the house will meet at 4pm.

Winding up the price-hike debate initiated in April, the water and power minister blamed the previous regime’s allegedly defective planning and international factors for the present situation and said the new government had brought down prices of various commodities, including petroleum products and essential food items like cooking oil, rice and pulses.

Earlier, the government shrugged off a move from the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) for holding a debate to mark the 37th anniversary of the secession of East Pakistan – also known as “the fall of Dhaka” — to become Bangladesh.

Privatisation Minister Naveed Qamar, speaking for the government, initially said a discussion could be held if a formal motion was moved instead of what he called an “out of the blue” move from MQM parliamentary leader Faooq Sattar, who had also proposed that the house pass a resolution calling for measures to avoid a repetition of the “tragedy of 1971”.

But Deputy Speaker Faisal Karim Kundi, who was then chairing the house, did not call for moving such a motion nor rule out Mr Sattar’s call despite reminders from the member from Karachi that his demand for a debate remained to be disposed of and words of support from Pakistan Muslim League-N members Sahibzada Fazal Karim and Hanif Abbasi.

Two private bills were introduced in the house after Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister Babar Awan agreed for their reference to the concerned standing committees.

The first bill, authored by PPP’s Yasmeen Rehman, seeks to further amend the Federal Public Service Commission Ordinance of 1977 to give representation to one member each of the National Assembly and the Senate on the commission and the other, by PML-Q’s Riaz Fatyana, proposed the creation of an authority to regulate, control and facilitate the business of Haj and Umra operators.