ISLAMABAD, May 17: The opposition paralysed the Senate for the third day on Thursday by noisy protests against the weekend’s bloodshed in Karachi and asked the government to resign for its alleged responsibility in the massacre that heightened an already raging judicial crisis in the country.
The evening sitting after a forced day’s recess lasted hardly seven minutes for the usual recitation from the holy Quran and slogan-chanting before Chairman Mohammedmian Soomro adjourned the house until 10.30am on Friday for possibly another day of similar protests and a likely prorogation by a presidential order, as happened with the National Assembly on Tuesday.
Both Parliamentary Affairs Minister Sher Afgan Niazi and opposition leader Mian Raza Rabbani rose almost simultaneously to speak at the start of the proceedings. But while opposition protests and desk-thumping drowned out some remarks made by the minister, Mr Rabbani avenged his failure to get the floor by leading protest chants such as “zalimo jawab dau, khoon ka hisab dau” (oppressors give reply, give account of blood) and “lathi goli ki sarkar, nahein chalegi, nahein chalegi” (rule by stick and bullet will not work).
The Senate has not been able to conduct any business during all its three sittings --- the previous being on Monday and Tuesday --- it held after Saturday’s Karachi killings blamed by all opposition parties on government ally Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), which denies the charge.
On Tuesday, the upper house was given a day’s break amid an uproar in a move aimed to let frayed tempers cool down, which did not seem to happen as the opposition parties continued to accuse the federal government and the Sindh provincial government of encouraging rather than getting hold of the killers to punish them.
At a joint news conference after probably the briefest sitting of the present Senate, Mr Rabbani and leaders of the parliamentary groups forming the combined opposition accused the federal government of being behind what they called planned killings and called for its resignation to make way for free and fair elections under a neutral government.
They also accused the government of failing to arrest any of those responsible for the May 12 killings and instead arresting workers of opposition parties in Karachi and other parts of the Sindh.
“This government should resign immediately,” Mr Rabbani said, adding that only the opposition parties, not the present government, were capable of providing a “healing touch” to Karachi citizens.
He said the Karachi killings, the murder of an assistant registrar of the Supreme Court in Islamabad and the arrest of a deputy inspector-general of Sindh police indicated a “pattern of state terrorism” aimed to deal with all matters related to the judicial crisis resulting from suspension and charge-sheeting of Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry by President Pervez Musharraf.
Awami National Party president Asfandyar Wali referred to Tuesday’s bomb blast in Peshawar that killed at least 22 people and clashes between militants and security forces in the North West Frontier Province's southern town of Tank and asked: “Is any place left in Pakistan where the life and property of people is safe?”
Senator Ishaq Dar of the Pakistan Muslim League-N said that while both Gen Musharraf and Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz were urging all ruling coalition partners to back the MQM, the opposition was united and would take the present struggle to its logical conclusion.
Senator Khalid Mahmood Soomro, general secretary of Sindh chapter of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal (MMA) alliance, said the Karachi police were disarmed before May 12 to give a free hand to what he called the “party of murderers” and added a federal government disapproval of the massacre should have meant removal of the Sindh governor and the MQM from the ruling coalition.
Prof Mohammad Ibrahim, another MMA senator from the NWFP, rejected reports of cross-fire in Karachi on May 12 and said it was a pattern of armed people firing on unarmed people.
Abdul Rahim Mandokhel of the Pashtunkhwa Milli Awami Party said “fascist methods” were used to crush supporters of the chief justice’s stand for the independence of judiciary and that two clear camps had emerged in the present situation --- one standing for parliamentary democracy and rule of law and the other for dictatorship, which he said would be liquidated.
