ISLAMABAD, Sept 17: The government is not sure that it will be able to reintroduce the Protection of Women Rights (PWR) bill when the National Assembly resumes its session on Monday or in the next few days as more meetings among parties and groups concerned were on the cards, Dawn learnt on Sunday.
Any hopes about reaching an accord with the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal appeared to have evaporated after a meeting between alliance president Qazi Hussain Ahmed and Pakistan Muslim League president Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain on Saturday as the former clearly stated that the bill was not a problem of the religious alliance.
Chaudhry Shujaat had announced on Friday that the bill would be returned to the NA select committee and the scope of debate would be extended to additional recommendations made by the government’s Ulema team.
PPP Parliamentarians, which had announced supporting the bill, has distanced itself from the process saying it will consider the bill clause by clause when it comes to the second and third reading and will only vote for the clauses which, in its opinion, protected women rights.
The Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) has also made it clear that it will not support any bill which was drafted outside the parliament house and will stick to the bill which was approved in the select committee.
Talking to Dawn, the deputy parliamentary leader and MMA’s expert on the bill, Hafiz Hussain Ahmed said that he was given an impression that a committee would be constituted to redraft the bill by incorporating the additional recommendations; however, it has not yet been set up, which means the process will take more time.
He further stated that the government intended to hold talks with its allied parties to seek consensus “which we support but it will again delay the finalisation of the draft”.
He did not expect that the bill would be reintroduced in the ongoing National Assembly session and it would ultimately be prorogued till the redrafting of the bill and the process of taking all parties into confidence had been completed.
He said President Gen Pervez Musharraf, now in the United States, would have to come back without being able to show to the US administration his achievement on getting the bill passed.
The sources, who requested anonymity, said it has been decided in principle that the six additional points recommended by the nine-member Ulema panel would now be incorporated in the original bill before it was re-referred to the National Assembly’s select committee.
The source, however, was not clear whether the recommendations of the said Ulema panel reached with the MMA will also be incorporated in the new draft of the bill.
