ISLAMABAD, Sept 5: Pressed by events in Balochistan, the government agreed to the tabling of an opposition constitution amendment bill for more provincial autonomy in the National Assembly on Tuesday, calling the widely backed move “the need of the hour”.

In an unusual show of accommodation, Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Khan Niazi promised to arrange consultations between the ruling party and the opposition, besides discussions in a house standing committee, to achieve a consensus on the bill, which seeks deletion of the key Concurrent Legislative List from the constitution.

The Constitution (Amendment) Bill 2006, sponsored by nine opposition members, was among 13 — mostly opposition-authored private bills — introduced in the house with the government’s consent on what was a private members’ day.

“It is the need of the hour,” Mr Niazi remarked after Abdul Mujeeb Pirzada of the People’s Party Parliamentarians (PPP) sought introduction of the constitution amendment bill, but suggested a deferment until consultations with ruling party president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, who also headed a now stalled parliamentary committee on Balochistan and provincial autonomy.

The minister he said could arrange these talks within a week.

But on insistence from some opposition members and ruling coalition colleague, all of whom referred to the fast developing situation in Balochistan after the August 26 killing of Baloch leader Nawab Akbar Khan Bugti in a military operation, Mr Niazi agreed to the immediate introduction of the bill and its reference to the concerned standing committee of the house.

He said talks could still be held with the PML chief in search of a consensus which, he added, could be possible because the government and opposition parties “all want harmony among (the four) federating units” of the country.

Mr Pirzada said the concurrent list of 35 subjects about which both the federation and provinces could legislate was originally meant to be abolished within 10 years after the adoption of the 1973 constitution but that could not be done because of the intervention of the 1977 army coup by General Mohammad Zia-ul-Haq.

Now, he said, while Balochistan and Sindh provinces were “in a state of war” because of government crackdowns and a sense of deprivation, it was necessary for the future of the federation to abolish this list, which will mean transfer of 35 listed subjects to full provincial jurisdiction.

“Let us sit together,” Mr Pirzada said as he seemed agreeable to defer the bill’s introduction for consultations between the two sides.

But his party members Qurban Ali Shah and Naveed Qamar as well as Pakistan Muslim League-N member Pervez Malik, Abdul Kadir Khanzada of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement and Farid Ahmad Piracha of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal, all of whom supported the bill on behalf of their parties, opposed delaying the issue.

MENGAL KEPT WAITING: Both Speaker Amir Hussain Chaudhry and Deputy Speaker Sardar Mohammad Yaqub were unusually accommodating to allow opposition members introduce bills, move some motions or make speeches on points order, but that was not the case with the only member of the Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) in the house, Abdul Rauf Mengal.