KARACHI: In what appears to be a move to firm up the Pakistan Peoples Party position in the March 3 Senate elections on 11 seats in Sindh, speaker Agha Siraj Durrani accepted the resignations tendered by four Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf lawmakers in August 2014.

Speaker Durrani made an announcement in this regard during the Sindh Assembly session that began on Wednesday.

He told the house that the resignations of the four PTI lawmakers — Syed Hafeezuddin, Khurram Sher Zaman, Samar Ali Khan and Dr Seema Zia — had been accepted and forwarded to the Election Commission of Pakistan for a formal notification.

While the ruling PPP claimed that the acceptance of the PTI lawmakers’ resignations had nothing to do with the upcoming Senate elections, the move appeared to be aimed at forestalling any chance of the combined opposition parties making gains in the Sindh senate polls.

Of the 11 seats, there are seven general seats and two each reserved for technocrats/ulema and women.

According to the senate election formula, 21 votes are needed to win one general seat of the Senate in Sindh. And 56 votes are needed to secure a seat reserved each for a technocrat and a woman parliamentarian.

In the 168-member house, the PPP has 91 members, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement 51, the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional 11, the PML-Nawaz eight and the National Peoples Party two.

Sources said that the opposition in the Sindh Assembly was holding talks to field their joint candidate to snatch one seat from the PPP. However, with the acceptance of the PTI resignations, the PPP is looking to retain its eight Senate seats.

Eight PPP senators Moula Bakhsh Chandio, Gul Muhammad Lot, Salim Mandviwalla, Islamuddin Shaikh, Abdul Qayoom Soomro (all five elected on general seats), Rehman Malik and Farooq Naek (both elected on technocrat seats) and Almas Perveen (women reserved seat) and three MQM senators Babar Ghauri and Abdul Haseeb Khan (elected on general seats) and Shirala Mallick (women reserved seat) are due to retire on March 11 after completing their six-year term.

The PTI lawmakers had tendered resignations from the Sindh Assembly in August last year after their party had decided to quit the assemblies in protest over alleged rigging in the May 2013 general elections.

MQM, PML factions stage separate walkouts

Lawmakers belonging to the MQM shouted anti-government slogans and staged a walkout when Speaker Durrani, who called the house in order at 10.50am, refused to allow MQM’s Ashfaq Mangi to raise a point of order on the issue of “extrajudicial killing” of their party workers.

The chair suggested the lawmaker to table an adjournment motion in this regard as he would not allow anyone to go against the rules of business. The MQM lawmakers stood up and started speaking at the same time. The speaker told them that it was their choice if they did not want to carry out business from the order of the day.

In protest over his response, the MQM legislators staged a token walkout, which was not joined by any other member of the opposition parties.

Led by the Leader of the Opposition in the Sindh Assembly Shahryar Mahar, the second walkout of the day was staged by the legislators of the PML-N and PML-F.

Mr Mahar asked the government what action they had taken against the owners of Sindh sugar mills for refusing to purchase sugar cane at the official rate of Rs182 per 40 kilograms.

He said that government should not run away from discussion in the house on the issue of the cane growers of Sindh.

Senior Minister Khuhro said that the government was aware of the growers’ problems and the opposition should not use it for mere point scoring. He said that the sugar mill owners had approached the court.

The parliamentary party leader of the MQM, Syed Sardar Ahmad, informed the house that the apex court had not issued any stay order to the sugar mills owners and the government ought to get its decision implemented.

The lawmakers of both factions of the PML again tried to seek answers from the minister but they did not get a satisfactory response.

The legislators, including former chief minister Dr Arbab Ghulam Rahim who came to attend the session after a long, walked out from the house.

Resolution against ‘blasphemous cartoons’

Before the chair called it a day and deferred entire business from the order of the day for Thursday’s sitting at 3.30 pm, the house had a two-hour discussion on the adjournment motion of PPP lawmaker Dr Sohrab Sarki about the publication of “blasphemous caricatures of Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)” by Charlie Hebdo.

Over a dozen speakers from both sides of aisle expressed their sentiments and termed it an international conspiracy against Muslims. After the discussion, a joint resolution was tabled on the subject. MQM’s Sardar Ahmed, PPP’s Khuhro and Ms Abbasi of the PML-F read it out and the house adopted it unanimously.

Published in Dawn, January 22nd, 2015

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