ISLAMABAD: Two days after one of Islamabad’s worst terrorist carnage, there was some tall talk in the National Assembly on Wednesday about a wished-for good time, but very little listening or admission of lapses that allowed an estimated over 40 minutes of killings in the heart of the capital at its district courts complex.

The main grouse about poor attendance and perceived non-seriousness in the house at the start of a debate on the government’s much-vaunted new internal security policy came from a major government ally, Pakhtunkhwa Milli Awami Party (PkMAP) chief Mahmood Khan Achakzai, who said nobody was listening to what another spoke and proposed that President Mamnoon Hussain better call a joint session of both houses of parliament for a 10-day debate.

Mr Achakzai seemed to attract a better attention to his oratory, which was marked by some ambitious goals he set for lawmakers and allies ranging from a new political commitment to defend Pakistan’s Constitution to close coordination with Afghanistan against terrorism and possibly bridging differences between India and China in a regional peace effort.

But his pontification evoked little backing from either the treasury or opposition benches, except for an endorsement of his call for a joint session by a back-bencher of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League-N (PML-N), Moeen Wattoo.

And the day’s main speaker from the main opposition Pakistan People’s Party (PPP), Abdul Sattar Bachani, even seemed to dismiss the PkMAP chief’s suggestion that both houses pass resolution that any future violation of the Constitution would “bring us on the streets” of Pakistan, pointing out that while the oath taken by members of parliament bound them to defend the Constitution, most had stayed inside their homes whenever any military dictator seized power and many joined such a regime in the past.

While urging all parties to support Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif for his five-year term so he could eradicate terrorism, Mr Achakzai said the goal could be possible only if both Pakistan and Afghanistan sincerely committed themselves to non-interference in each other’s and all neighbours’ internal affairs.

He said he was sure the United States too would support such a move and predicted that if Mr Sharif and Afghan President Hamid Karzai “sit together” they could also bridge “the gap” between India and China and prompt even “Japan to come” in the arrangement.

While Mr Achakzai complained of non-seriousness of lawmakers at the start of his speech, Mr Nabil Ahmed Gabol of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) rose some time later to tell the chair that he would not speak now as the attendance in the 342-seat house had by then dwindled to just about a dozen, including a federal minister and two ministers of state.

Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan, who had announced the new security policy on Feb 26, was not present in Wednesday’s sitting, probably because of the resumption of a dialogue between a government team and nominees of Taliban militants at Akora Khattak, prompting complaints from some lawmakers, particularly those seeking explanations about Monday’s gunfire and suicide bomb blasts at the Islamabad district courts that left 11 people, including an additional district and sessions judge and some lawyers, dead and 29 injured.

Though the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has dissociated itself from the attack, which came two days after the TTP announced a ceasefire for a month, lawmakers raised questions about the militants’ sincerity in view of their truce violations in previous years, with MQM’s Salman Baloch suspecting a new Taliban tactic to continue their deadly attacks in spite of the ceasefire but not claim them.

PPP’s Bachani too was suspicious about TTP sincerity and their strings being pulled from “somewhere else” as he noted that the new round of talks had begun after the head of the Taliban negotiating team, Maulana Samiul Haq, had returned from a Saudi visit.

Opposition Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaf lawmaker Shirin Mazari proposed a three-pronged anti-terrorism approach – disengaging those willing to give up violence, isolating those bent upon waging war and then exterminating these hardliners — and called for countering the extremist propaganda and reviewing the syllabi of religious seminaries.

PML-N’s retired major Tahir Iqbal, from Punjab, too called for counter moves against the militants’ “psychological and ideological warfare” and for isolating those refusing to obey the Constitution.

Two members of the PTI-allied Jamaat-i-Islami from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Sahibzada Tariqullah and Aisha Syed, seemed to show some warmth for the treasury benches as both congratulated the interior minister and his team for preparing the 100-page security policy and supported the government’s dialogue with the Taliban, whose negotiating team includes the JI’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa chief and former senator, Prof Mohammad Ibrahim.

Opposition Awami National Party’s senior figure Haji Ghulam Ahmed Bilour, who was railways minister in the previous PPP-led coalition government, also appreciated Chaudhry Nisar’s statement in the house while announcing the security policy that the military would target a militant group’s headquarters if it made any attack in the future, saying such a course was not taken by the previous government.

But he lamented that his party, which headed the previous Pakhtunkhwa provincial government but lost in the May 11 general election, was “thrown into teht-us-sara” (abyss) by unspecified forces despite its sacrifices in fighting terrorism in the province.

SNUB TO DASTI: Jamshed Ahmed Dasti, an independent from Punjab, got a snub from Speaker Sardar Ayaz Sadiq as the member interrupted the proceedings apparently to express his no-confidence in a special seven-member committee approved by the house on Tuesday to probe the member’s allegations of immoral activities being allowed in the parliament lodges.

The chair asked Mr Dasti to write to the committee if he had any complaint rather than making the whole house hostage to his wishes.

It was about that time that the multi-party committee was holding a meeting in a committee room where Mr Dasti did not appear, committee sources said, but he was seen talking to some of the committee members when they returned to the house.

The committee will hold another meeting on Thursday to which Mr Dasti has been invited again, a committee press release issued later said.