May 12, 2003	Monday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 9, 1424

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ISLAMABAD, May 11: When the government says the Legal Framework Order (LFO) does not affect the masses, it attempts to mislead them, contended Raza Rabbani, PPP parliamentary leader in Senate, here on Sunday.

Speaking to a group of newsmen, he said President Gen Pervez Musharraf on Oct 26, 2002, two weeks after the expiry of his so-called legislative powers, promulgated IRO 2002, now part of the LFO, which usurped the economic rights of the labour class.

An impression, he said, was also being created by the vested interests that if the question of Musharraf’s uniform, his discretionary powers under 58(2)(B) and formation of National Security Council were sorted out with the opposition parties, everything else would be acceptable.

This, he said, was also misleading.

The People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) leader said the whole LFO would have to be brought before parliament for a detailed discussion on every part of the document as its implications were very wide and stretched to all spheres of life.

Referring to Article 270 AA of the LFO, the PPP leader said that it talked of different legislative instruments — i.e. president orders, ordinances, chief executive orders, oath of the office of judges, Referendum Order, etc. — which the military ruler used in his three-year period.

“Parliament could not be asked to provide cover to all orders made, proceedings taken place, appointments made, including the secondments and deputations, and acts done by authority or by any person, which were made, taken or done,” the People’s Party Parliamentarians leader added.

Making a reference to NAB ordinances, he said parliament would not provide cover to the NAB which was totally politically motivated, selective in approach and under which the burden of proof was shifted to the accused.

Referring to another law promulgated, which barred specifically Ms Benazir Bhutto and Mian Nawaz Sharif from contesting for the post of prime minister for a third time, the PPP leader said that such laws could not be approved without a debate on them in parliament.

Raza Rabbani said Gen Musharraf promulgated 292 laws in three years, majority of them in the last year. Above all, 67 ordinances were promulgated after Oct 12, 2002, when the military ruler had lost all kinds of legitimacy, and all those were of far reaching consequences, he added.