July 8, 2003	Tuesday	Jumadi-ul-Awwal 7,1424

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)

ISLAMABAD, July 7: Opposition parties in the National Assembly on Monday withdrew their no-trust move against deputy speaker Sardar Mohammad Yaqub after accepting Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali’s offer to resume stalled talks over the Legal Framework Order.

The offer, extended by Mr Jamali to break the deadlock after a day-long debate on the opposition’s resolution seeking to remove Mr Yaqub, was immediately accepted by parliamentary leaders of all major opposition parties.

On the prime minister’s appeal, the opposition also withdrew its resolution against the deputy speaker for his alleged partiality in conducting the house when it debated a similar move against Speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain on July 28 that had ended without a vote.

Mr Jamali said that he would convene the promised meeting of leaders of all opposition parties after the return of Pakistan Muslim League-Q’s leader, Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, from abroad, adding: “We will resume (talks) from where we had left off.”

The failure to hold the meeting after deliberations by a bipartisan parliamentary committee in May had heightened tensions between the government and opposition parties over the LFO.

The new development came only two days after the president returned from a 17-day-long trip to Britain, the United States, Germany and France.

Mr Jamali, while speaking in the National Assembly, expressed his pleasure over Monday’s comparatively orderly debate and hoped that the opposition would continue to display the same attitude in the future.

“I think this Parliament has started functioning today and God-willing it will continue to function,” he said.

Stressing the need for tolerance on both sides of the House, the prime minister said that whatever had happened in the past should be forgotten.

“I appeal to the opposition, for God’s sake, to come forward. Let us meet and look towards tomorrow,” he said.

“If the opposition parties want to see Jamali as a strong prime minister, (they should) come (forward). Let us run the Parliament together,” he said.

Mr Jamali apparently rejected the opposition’s charges regarding his stay in office was dependent on special favours from President Musharraf, whom the prime minister had once called “my boss”.

Emphasizing on his independence, he said that he had made the offer on his own, adding that if ever he became aware that he did not enjoy enough autonomy, he would depart honourably.

Maulana Fazlur Rehman, Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal’s secretary- general, was the first to welcome the prime minister’s offer for talks. He agreed to withdraw the no-confidence motion against the deputy speaker.

“We want to take this conciliatory atmosphere (and move) forward. (We) will extend full cooperation in this regard,” he said.

Leader of the People’s Party Parliamentarians Makhdoom Amin Fahim said the party sought dialogue for settling outstanding issues, welcoming what he called a “show of flexibility” by the prime minister.

“The opposition respects this (move) and we are ready ... to settle the issue democratically,” he said.

Pakistan Muslim League-N’s acting president Javed Hashmi said the prime minister had shown grace and “we accept his invitation for talks”.

Jamaat-i-Islami chief Qazi Hussain Ahmed saw the development as being a product of divine intervention but struck a cautionary note, saying that the country could plunge into a deeper crisis if the government continued with its insistence that the LFO was part of the Constitution.

Apart from the four of the leaders above, 17 other opposition members spoke on the no-confidence resolution, mainly targeting the LFO and the president.

The lengthy debate concluded with deputy speaker Yaqub defending his position after only two speeches in his favour from the treasury benches.

The opposition also sharply criticized the military’s role in politics, prompting the chair to expunge several remarks from the proceedings, provoking more opposition protests.

Finally the resolution was withdrawn on a motion moved by PPP’s Nabil Gabole.

The house was later prorogued by a presidential order.

DEBATE: Several opposition speakers said that both the no- confidence moves — first against the speaker and then against the deputy speaker — had been tabled to voice their resentment against the presidential decrees forming the LFO, which they did not recognise as being part of the Constitution.

Reiterating the opposition stand on the LFO, they said that these decrees should not become part of the constitution unless approved by a two- third majority in both the houses of parliament.

Some said there would have been no need to bring on the second no—trust resolution, if the deputy speaker had not blocked opposition members from speaking on June 28.

Deputy speaker Yaqub defended his decision to disallow too many members to speak, saying that if he remained in office, he would conduct the house impartially.

An apparently embarrassing situation for the ruling party arose when on a suggestion from one of its own members — Mohammad Wasi Zafar — a portion of the record of the assembly’s inaugural session in November was read out to ascertain whether the members had taken oath under the LFO or under the Constitution as it stood before the October 12, 1999 coup.

Sher Afgan Niazi of the People’s Party Patriots said he that he had himself seen the copy of the Constitution that the then presiding officer Elahi Bux Soomro had with him when he was administering oath to the newly-elected members and it was the one printed in 1996 without the LFO being part of it.

Amid excited remarks from both sides over the issue, Maulana Fazlur Rehman said Mr Niazi’s evidence negated the speaker’s ruling which, according to him, had no validity at all.

A total of 123 opposition members earlier stood up to support the resolution against the 143, who were present on June 28 to back the one moved against the speaker.

MMA’s Liaquat Baloch opened the opposition’s barrage, saying the LFO sought to impose the military’s supremacy over the country rather than that of the parliament and warned the government that it would be responsible if the opposition was forced to take the issue to the streets.

Qazi Hussain Ahmed asked the speaker to withdraw his pro-LFO ruling, saying it would earn him the opposition’s confidence and cooperation.

Makhdoom Amin Fahim of the PPP said the opposition would defend the 1973 Constitution “to the last extent” and urged Mr Jamali to stand up against “undemocratic actions of his boss”.

Pukhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party leader Mahmood Khan Achakzai complained of a “continuing martial law” in the country, saying that the military and intelligence agencies should not interfere in the country’s politics.

Maulana Fazlur Rehman said the opposition would fight out the battle for solidarity of the country and democracy.

PPP’s Aitzaz said it was wrong to defend the LFO on the basis of the opposition’s participation in last October’s election and recalled a Supreme Court decision in the 1970s that described General Yahya Khan a usurper but upheld the result of the elections he had held in 1970.

Farooq Sattar of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, in a speech punctuated with Urdu couplets, defended the deputy speaker and advised the opposition to avoid confrontation that he said could derail the transition to full democracy.

Other speakers were Abdul Rauf Mengal (BNP-Mengal), Khwaja Mohammad Asif (PML-N), Raja Pervez Ashraf (PPP), Hafiz Hussain Ahmed (MMA), Shah Mahmood Qureshi (PPP), Tehmina Daultana (PML- N), Farid Ahmad Piracha (MMA), Raja Nadir Pervaiz (PML-N), Maulana Mohammad Khan Sherani (MMA), Khwaja Saad Rafiq (PML-N), Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri (MMA), Syed Qurban Ali Shah (PPP), Begum Ishrat Ashraf (PML-N), Nawab Mohammad Yousuf Talpur (PPP) Assadullah Bhutto (MMA), and Mohammad Wasi Zafar (PML-Q).