ISLAMABAD, Aug 9: Qaumi Jamhoori Party (QJP), while supporting the idea of forming National Security Council (NSC), opposed the inclusion of any serving Chief of Army Staff in it.

The NSC should comprise the president, prime minister, chairman of Senate, opposition leaders in the National Assembly and Senate, chairman of Joint Chief of Staff Committee, ministers for finance, defence, foreign affairs and interior, the QJP said in a rejoinder to the National Reconstruction Bureau on constitutional amendment package.

The QJP further said the NSC should be a temporary body for a defined period of 10 years or three parliamentary terms. “It should be a transitional machinery, which is designated to restore effective and substantive democracy to the people of Pakistan.

“We support in principle the constitutional reform package with reservations on a number of proposed amendments,” the QJP secretary-general, Zafar Mirza, said. The QJP suggested that there should an constitutional institution of parliamentary ombudsman to hear and investigate complaints against parliamentarians.

“To ensure inter-provincial harmony and strengthen federalism, the share of Punjab’s seats in parliament should be reduced to 50 per cent and thus creating a parity between the Punjab and other provinces,” it added.

It called for allocation of special seats for industrial workers and peasants and increasing the experience of technocrats from 10 to 16 years. It said that the presidency should be rotated among provinces to strengthen the federation. On the money bill, it said it should be passed in a joint session of parliament to help promote interprovincial harmony and give both the houses of parliament equal powers, scrutinise, deliberate on and participate in money matters.

On the conduct of elections, the QJP welcomed double vote to non-Muslim minorities and understood that an attempt had been made to remedy political and electoral victimisation.

The QJP rejected the unbridled and arbitrary powers to returning officers to reject nomination papers, particularly on some “information.”