March 29, 2007	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 9, 1428

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LAHORE, March 28: The treasury benches on Wednesday successfully thwarted debate on law and order by diverting the discussion to, what they called, forgery by the opposition in convening the session.

As the leader of opposition Qasim Zia took the floor immediately after the recitation from the Holy Quran, law minister Raja Muhammad Basharat stood up to the question of the legality of the session which he claimed was convened on the basis of a forged document.

Waving the list of signatories (on whose request the session was convened), the law minister said it included Rana Tajamal Husain’s name who was not a member of the house. “The opposition has cheated the speaker to convene the session,” he said and added: “It is tantamount to forgery and the session convened on such a document is illegal. The speaker should give a clear ruling on it and constitute a committee to look into the forgery and recommend an appropriate action against those who committed it.”

The accusation took the debate to different level and the house descended into chaos. Both sides hooted and accused each other of berating democracy and constitutional institutions.

Rana Sanaullah, deputy opposition leader, said on the point of order Rana Tajamal Husain was de-seated through illegal means and to him he was still a member of the house. He said Mr Tajamal was part of the parliamentary party of the PML-N which signed the requisition. Therefore, his name was included in the list.

Rana Sana also insisted that the matter of convening a session was prerogative of the speaker and could not be discussed in the house. “Anything that happens in the speaker’s secretariat could not be taken up in the house as it is a prerogative attached to the speaker’s office. The chair should give a ruling whether events in the office could be discussed in the house. If so, the opposition would be forced to make public all wrongdoings being committed in the secretariat of the speaker,” he said.

The law minister took the floor again to claim that another opposition member - Rana Aftab Khan - also did not sign the requisition. Rana Aftab, however, denied the charge and said he personally went to the Assembly Secretariat to submit the requisition.

The speaker, though reserved his detailed ruling on whether any event in his office could be brought up in the house, formed a seven-member committee to look into the matter of a non-member’s appearance in the list of MPAs.

The chair, however, refused to prorogue the session on the law minister’s plea that it was illegal. The speaker maintained that even if signatures of the two suspects were taken off the list, those requisitioning the house met the required numbers. The house needed only 93 members to be convened and the opposition had submitted a list of 98 members.

The opposition members insisted that 96 of them were present in the house and owned signatures. Thus, there was no justification for calling for proroguing the house. But it failed to satisfy the treasury benches, led by Raja Basharat, and kept demanding that the house should be prorogued opposition should submit a fresh requisition if it wanted to.

The debate took around one hour before normal business started after the speaker’s refusal to prorogue the house.

The agenda became next point of friction between the treasury and the opposition. The latter said it had also submitted agenda (debate on law and order) along with the requisition, but the government had ignored it and put question hour on the food department instead.

It wanted to suspend normal agenda and debate on law and order which the speaker refused and the question hour started. The house turned quorum-less and a few members boringly rumbled through the questions.