08 July 2004	Thursday	19 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

Please Visit our Sponsor (Ads open in separate window)

ISLAMABAD, July 7: The opposition in the Senate on Wednesday challenged Finance Minister Shaukat Aziz's candidacy for the National Assembly to qualify for prime ministership and complained of 'pre-poll rigging', which the government denied.

The ruling coalition dismissed the argument that Mr Aziz could not stand in the by-election for two lower house seats in Punjab and Sindh while continuing as minister and dared the opposition parties to prove their strength in the vote set for August 18.

But there was no immediate government reply to Democratic Alliance parliamentary leader Raza Rabbani's point that a two-year-old Election Commission order barring sitting ministers from standing in the October 2002 general elections was still valid.

Leader of house Wasim Sajjad, who said there was no constitutional ban on Mr Aziz's candidacy, advised the opposition to agitate the matter before election returning officers rather than using the Senate as a campaign platform.

Mr Rabbani, speaking on a point of order, said Mr Aziz, who is a Senate member and must be elected to the National Assembly to become prime minister, had not only defied the Election Commission notification but also "involved his whole Finance Ministry in his election campaign".

He placed on the table of the house the commission's order as well as a July 5 circular issued by the finance ministry's public relations director-general announcing Mr Aziz's visit to Attock on Tuesday to file his nomination papers and inviting the media to cover the event.

"If this is not using the ministry (for electioneering) then what it is after his nomination for the prime minister?" Mr Rabbani asked about the circular about the finance minister's trip to file the papers at the court of the Attock additional district and sessions judge, who will be the returning officer for the election. "This is the first pre-poll rigging."

In the August 13, 2002, notification that it said it issued in exercise of powers conferred by the constitution's article 218 and the Election Commission Order, 2002, the Election Commission said it was "pleased to issue directions to the returning officers that nomination papers of the sitting governor of any province, federal minister or provincial minister should not be accepted for elections to any National Assembly or a provincial assembly constituency or the Senate of Pakistan unless and until they relinquish their offices".

"This notification is holding the field...under which Shaukat Aziz has to resign (as minister)," Mr Rabbani said but voiced his fears that the government might get that order rescinded by an acting Chief Election Commissioner appointed after incumbent Irshad Hassan Khan left for about a month's ex-Pakistan leave.

Mr Sajjad said the August 2002 order, requiring ministers to resign before contesting an election, was issued in a peculiar situation when the constitution was in suspension although there was no such bar in the constitution or election rules.

He asked whether former prime minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, British Prime Minister Tony Blair or any American president had to resign their offices before contesting an election?

Mr Sajjad as well as some other ruling coalition senators said inviting journalists to cover the filing of nomination papers by Mr Aziz did not amount to putting pressure on them.

Water and Power Minister Aftab Ahmed Khan Sherpao said the condition to resign before seeking an election applied only to ministers of an interim cabinet set up after the dissolution of the National Assembly and not to the present cabinet.

There were loud protests from the ruling coalition when a Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal senator from Balochistan, Mohammad Ismail Buledi, called for Mr Aziz's clarification following a newspaper report that quoted an Islamic group leader's claiming that the finance minister belonged to the Ahmedia sect.

The finance minister, who was not present in the house as he had gone to Tharparkar in Sindh to file his nomination papers for the second vacated National Assembly seat, said last week that he was a Sunni Muslim.

Mr Buledi, who challenged the finance minister to go to the Supreme Court to disprove the allegation, was accused by Mr Wasim Sajjad of trying to spread sectarianism. Acting chairman Khalilur Rehman ended an uproar by stopping members from speaking any more on the matter, drawing more protests from MMA benches.

PEACE AFTER ACRIMONY: But the acrimony over Mr Aziz's candidacy and heat over an adjournment motion by PPP senator Farhatullah Babar about non-payment of electricity net profits to the NWFP later gave way to peace when the treasury and opposition benches agreed to improve a proposed amendment to the rules of procedure to provide for an annual calendar of the house in a parliamentary year.

The amendment, moved by Minister of State for Law and Parliamentary Affairs Mohammad Raza Hayat Hiraj, required the government to provide to the Senate chairman a provisional calendar of sessions for the parliamentary year at the commencement of the first session of each year.

With the consent of both sides, the chair set up a five-member committee chaired by Mr Sajjad to suggest improvements by next week before the prorogation of the current session. Other committee members are Mr Hiraj and Chaudhry Mohammad Anwar Bhinder from the treasury benches and Mr Rabbani and Prof Ghafoor Ahmed from the opposition.

The Senate was adjourned until 10am on Friday after talking out a joint call-attention notice tabled by Prof Mohammad Ibrahim Khan of the MMA and Farhatullah Babar over the government's failure to announce the sixth National Finance Commission award about provincial share in federal revenues.